Box Score

BOWLING GREEN, Ohio – The Cornell volleyball team fell to Bowling Green State University, 3-0, this evening in the opening round of the Best Western Falcon Plaza Invitational. Cornell (1-3) rebounded after a 25-15 loss in the first set to challenge the host Falcons before falling in the final two sets, 25-21 and 27-25. The Big Red will be back in action tomorrow as it plays back-to-back against Oakland and IPFW at 2 p.m., and 4:30 p.m., respectively.

Madeleine Przybyl led Cornell with six kills, posting no errors on 14 attempts for a .429 hitting percentage. She also posted four block assists, helping the Big Red to eight total blocks for the set. Jordan Reeder handed out 11 assists, while Risa Ka'awa and Sierra Young had 10 and nine digs, respectively.

Bowling Green (2-5) was led by Paige Penrod with 13 kills, while Noelle Spitler chipped in 11. Laura Avila and Sam Fish split the setting duties with Avila registering 23 assists to go along with Fish's 18. Defensively, Ashley Dunn tallied a game-high 20 digs, while Penrod was also in double-digits with 13.

The first set started out as a fairly even contest before the Falcons used an 11-2 scoring run to build an insurmountable 22-13 lead en route to the 25-15 victory.

The Big Red responded by getting out to a 3-0 lead early in the second set. Although BGSU fought back to take the lead, eventually going up 17-12, Cornell stormed back to make it a two-point game with the Falcons leading, 19-17. From there, a pair of kills by Spitler, coupled with two hitting errors from the Big Red, gave the home team a four-point advantage that it would not relinquish the rest of the way.

The final set proved to be a heated battle with the teams seeing 10 ties before Cornell used a kill by Young, a Falcon attack error, and a kill and a service ace by Erin McCarthey to take the 20-16 lead. The Big Red held the four-point lead all the way to 24-20, but four straight kills by BGSU and an attack error from Cornell gave the home team the 25-24 advantage. The teams traded points on a pair of errors before a kill from Lindsey Butterfield handed the Falcons the 27-25 victory.