KALAMAZOO, Mich. – The Western Michigan volleyball team rallied from a 1-0 deficit to win three straight sets at home, defeating the Bowling Green State Falcons 3-1 (12-25, 25-17, 28-26, 25-17) at University Arena on Saturday. With the win the Broncos improve to 8-13 overall on the season and 4-2 in Mid-American Conference play.
Sydney LeMay and Olivia Kofie tied for the match high with 14 kills apiece and did so efficiently, recording attack percentages of .414 and .320 respectively. Alysia Baznik finished just behind them with her sixth double-double of the season by recording 13 kills and a team-high 17 digs. Early in the fourth set Baznik recorded her 1,000th career dig to become just the ninth player in program history to reach the mark. Three other Broncos reached double-digits in digs as Hailey Knecht recorded 13, Caroline Rose 11 and Izabella Porada 10. Mary Murphy added 47 assists and set the Broncos to a .243 hitting percentage.
WMU rebounded from a tough first set to cruise against the Falcons in the second, never once giving up the lead and taking a relatively easy 25-17 decision. Nicole Kinser put the Broncos ahead 12-9 on a kill by Nicole Kinser and Murphy forced the Falcons into their second timeout of the set with an ace off the arms of Nicole Slimko to make it 19-13. LeMay finished off the decision with a huge bounce kill off a slide play, jamming home the shot on set point to tie the overall match at 1-1.
The Broncos led for much of the third set as well and in fact never gave the lead up there, either, but WMU was forced to hold off a late Falcon rally to take the 2-1 advantage in the match. Alyssa Maloney recorded an ace at 23-all to force a Bronco timeout but Kofie responded with a kill to retake the advantage. LeMay broke a 25-all stalemate with a kill and freshman Bailey Schnell delivered two points later to make it 27-26. This time the Broncos were ready for the BGSU attack as Murphy and LeMay blocked Slimko on set point to take it 28-26 and the overall match lead.
The fourth set started out tight but the Broncos broke it open in a big way, turning a 10-all tie into an 18-11 advantage in the blink of an eye. Kofie pushed the lead to three points with a kill to make it 13-10 and the middle blocking duo of LeMay and Kinser blocked Jelena Sunjic to close the 8-1 run, stuffing the shot to make it 18-11. LeMay won the race to 20 with a kill to make it 20-14 and Kofie added the kill shot, bouncing a kill off a Murphy set to win the game 25-17 and the match 3-1.
