Lady Coyotes pound Bethany, take over top spot in KCAC
By: David Toelle, KWU Sports Information

LINDSBORG – What a difference a player makes. In Kansas Wesleyan and Bethany’s first meeting of the year, KWU was without the services of hitter Sarah Claborn. Bethany swept the Lady Coyotes in that first meeting. Claborn was in the lineup tonight and was key as KWU easily took care of Bethany 30-16, 30-22, 30-21, to take over the top spot in the KCAC standings.

The Lady Coyotes and the Swedes entered tonight tied for the top spot in the KCAC at 12-1, but now Bethany sees itself a game back with four matches remaining.

KWU easily took care of business in game one, winning 30-16, and continued to trend throughout the match.

Claborn was on fire in the first game, tallying nine of her 22 kills in that game alone as the Lady Coyotes put 21 balls on the floor in the first game.

Game two saw Wesleyan jump out to a 2-0 lead thanks to a pair of Bethany errors, but the Swedes would answer, scoring five of the next six to take a 5-3 lead and force a KWU timeout. Ashley Winters would get a kill to break the Bethany run, but two straight points would keep the Swedes ahead 7-4.

Wesleyan (20-7, 13-1) would close the gap to 8-7 on a kill and ace by Kolby Rhoades, but a service error would put Bethany up 9-7. Claborn would answer the call and get things back on track for the Lady Coyotes with a kill, but another service error would send the ball back to Bethany.

The Lady Coyotes would then go back to Claborn and she responded. Two kills by Claborn sandwiched around a block gave Wesleyan a 11-10 lead. After Bethany would tie it up at 11, Claborn would kill again for a 12-11 lead. The Swedes would tie it up at 12-all when Wesleyan exploded. Sparked by a huge block, Wesleyan would score six of the next seven points to blow the game wide open at 18-13. Bethany would not get any closer than 23-19 as Wesleyan closed out the game on a 4-1 run, with game point scored thanks to a block by Whitney DuBois.

Bethany scored the first point of game three, but Wesleyan quickly answered with four in a row as part of a 11-5 run to take a 11-6 lead. The Swedes would get within three at 14-11 on a net violation by Wesleyan’s Ashley Winters, but Claborn would put a ball down sparking a 5-0 KWU run giving the Lady Coyotes a 19-11 lead.

Bethany (19-7, 13-2) would score two points in a row before Rhoades would take over the match. A kill by Rhoades got the run started, as she would hit Bethany libero Brittany Westenfelder in the face and then put an ace at her feet, followed by another ace and a kill as Rhoades would score five points in a row to give Wesleyan a 24-13 lead.

A service error would break the run, but Winters would put down a kill to get Wesleyan back on serve, and would take a 27-14 lead on an ace from Winters.

Bethany would score four in a row before a Rhoades block and a Claborn kill would set up match point at 29-18. Bethany would score three in a row before Claborn would finish things off with a kill, giving Wesleyan the 30-21 win in game three.

Claborn led the way with 22 kills while hitting .383. Rhoades would add 18 and Winters had 10 as Wesleyan had a 37.5 percent hitting percentage on the night. Rhoades would have two aces along with Karissa Kent and Kelli Berg to lead the Wesleyan servers. Berg would have 51 assists to go along with 11 digs. Kent led the way with 21 digs, while Rhoades added 15 and Claborn and Berg had 11 each. Rhoades led the way with three solo blocks, while Winters and Ashley Geasland each had a pair of assisted blocks.

Wesleyan is back in action on Wednesday at Southwestern, before returning home to face Bethel on Saturday at 2 p.m. at Muir Gym.

-- KWU SI --