ORANGE, Calif. – The University of Redlands women's volleyball team (3-12, 1-4 SCIAC) lost in straight sets, 3-0, at Chapman University Saturday afternoon.
Lily Kautai (San Mateo, CA) had two kills off Makenna Vanhofwegen (Buckeye, AZ) assists, while Tiana Mariner (Lehi, UT) added an ace and Emily Kitchin (Portland, OR) with another kill as well that tied things up early.
Trailing by one, 5-4, an Esha Ball (Fresno, CA) kill sparked a 3-0 run that gave the Bulldogs their first lead of the match, 7-5.
They maintained this advantage as late as 8-7 before an 8-2 Chapman run put them behind by five, 15-10. The closest Redlands got from that point forward was four, after a service error, as the host Panthers went up 1-0.
In the most competitive set on the afternoon, the Bulldogs held a two-point second set lead, 7-5, thanks to a pair of kills by Kitchin and another two by Jaycee Hullar (Lake Elsinore, CA) and Kautai.
Each side then traded pushes until Redlands found themselves up by two once again, 11-9. For the remainder of the set neither team led by more than two and there were six ties.
Despite the back-and-forth, it was Redlands, on the back of a 4-1 run, that gave them a set point at 24-22 after they were down one, 21-20. During the run Kitchin added two more kills with Mariner collecting her second ace of the afternoon and Hannah Hajnal (El Cerrito, CA) found Cecily Wagstaff (Portland, OR) to set up the set point.
Chapman, however, ended the set with four straight as they bookended the set with kills along with a pair of Bulldog errors in the middle as they got to within one set of the match, 2-0.
Needing to be close to perfect to have a chance at a comeback in the third, Redlands held a 5-3 lead after four in a row, in which Vanhofwegen found Hullar for two kills and Kautai adding an ace.
That 4-0 run would quickly be eliminated by the Panthers as they scored eight unanswered points going in front by six, 11-5.
Redlands did stem the tide with a Kitchin kill and a Chapman attacking error that made it a four-point set, 12-8. The Panthers, though, did not slow down, recording three kills during a 5-0 stretch that extended their lead to seven, 17-8, and effectively ending the match as they eventually won by double digits, 25-14.
Kitchin and Kautai had 11 kills each, Vanhofwegen added 24 assists to her career total, which now sits at 995 as she looks to become the eighth player in program history to reach the 1K mark. Mariner had 17 digs, a game-high, and two service aces, also a game-high.
After a couple of days off, the Bulldogs return to Currier Gymnasium this Tuesday, October 13 when they host Claremont-Mudd-Scripps beginning at 7:00 p.m.
