A Close Battle and an Unexpected Challenge
The Lady Eagles took the court today in their first ACCA National Tournament match against the Lady Saints of Hillsdale, and came up just short in a five set battle. Emmaus had trouble shaking off jitters in the first set, and Hillsdale cruised to a quick victory (11-25). The Lady Eagles came alive in set two, pulling off a 25-21 win. The Lady Saints responded with at 18-25 set three win, and Emmaus countered with a 25-22 score in set four. Hillsdale pushed the fatigued Emmaus squad out of system in set five, and earned an 8-15 victory to seal the match. "Hillsdale is a great team, and I believe that we played them very well," said Coach Pitman. "We hit .135 as a team for the match, played hard and unified, but just didn't have enough firepower in the end." Molly Skoglund (ACCA All-American Honorable Mention) had 30 digs in the match. Hannah Bell (ACCA 1st Team All-American) had 29 assists, 5 kills and 4 aces. Chelsea Smith contributed 10 kills.
The second match of the day found the Lady Eagles pitted against the defending national champions, Arlington Baptist. Emmaus found themselves in a tough situation as this was the first match they would play all season without setter Hannah Bell, who was unable to play due to illness. "Hannah struggled through the sickness against Hillsdale, and was physically unable to continue to play tonight," said Coach Pitman.
Emmaus was forced to juggle their small roster, and it was Savannah Petersen who answered the call to fill the setting role. Elizabeth Brame moved to the outside hitter position, and the Lady Eagles prepared to put up a fight against Arlington. While they struggled to find themselves in sets one and two (10-25, 7-25), things started to click in set three as the Lady Eagles came away scoring 19 points in the losing effort. Savannah had 14 assists, an ace, and 2 block assists in her setting debut. "I can't express enough how pleased we are with Savvy and Brame," said Coach Pitman. "We asked them to do something out of their comfort zone against a very tough opponent, and I am so proud of them for giving their very best unselfish effort for the sake of the team."
Emmaus continues tournament play tomorrow against Trinity at 1:00 pm and Ozark at 4:00 pm. Saturday's single elimination seeding will be announced tomorrow afternoon.