La Crosse, Wis. - The University of Wisconsin-La Crosse volleyball team fell 3-1 (20-25, 25-15, 25-13, 25-19) to UW-Oshkosh Tuesday night in Mitchell Hall in the first round of the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) Championship (Presented by Culver's). The Eagles finish their season at 16-13 while the Titans improve to 17-14 and advance to play at UW-Whitewater in Thursday's semifinals.
The opening set was tied, 15-15, when UWL scored the next three points to lead 18-15. UW-Oshkosh cut the lead to 18-17, but UWL took the next two points on back-to-back kills from
Rhiana Pochman. The Eagles went on to earn the 25-20 victory.
Rhiana Pochman hit .261 (9-3-23) in Tuesday's match.
UW-Oshkosh scored five of the first six points in the second set before UWL came back to cut the lead to 6-3 on an
Kathryn Maas kill. The Eagles would get no closer as the Titans went on a 6-2 run to lead 12-5.
Scoring the first three points in the third set, UW-Oshkosh never trailed in earning the 25-13 victory. UWL cut the deficit to 8-4 before UW-Oshkosh scored seven of the next 10 points to lead 15-7.
UWL led 3-1 in the fourth set before UW-Oshkosh went on an 9-4 run to lead 10-7. Pochman's kill later cut the lead to 14-13, but the Titans scored the next five points and secured the fourth set victory.
Emma Lawrence led UWL with 10 kills while Pochman finished with nine. Maas,
Marisa Johnson and
Liz Lansink each recorded eight kills.
Abbey Fox recorded 39 assists as the Eagles hit .141 overall (46-25-149). After hitting .262 (14-3-42) in the first set, UWL hit .194 (12-6-31) in the second set, .083 (11-8-36) in the third set and .025 (9-8-40) in the fourth.
Julia Van Fleet had a team-high 19 digs with Johnson recording 14. UWL finished with 8.0 team blocks with Maas recording one block solo and four block assists.
Renee Rush led UW-Oshkosh with 13 kills with Tina Elstner finishing with 11. Rush hit .379 (13-2-29) with Elstner at .265 (11-2-34). Emma Kiekhofer recorded 20 assists and Rebecca Doughty 16 as the Titans hit .254 (50-15-138) overall. UW-Oshkosh hit .098 (11-7-41) in the first set, but came back with .310 (12-3-29) in the second set, .458 (12-1-24) in the third and .250 (15-4-44) in the fourth.
Rachel Garnder had 30 digs for the Titans. UW-Oshkosh finished with 10.0 team blocks as Shelby Coron had three block solos and one block assist.
