Bears win five-set thriller against Central Connecticut

Friday, September 17

West Hartford, Conn.

4:00 PM

Brown University

Central Connecticut State

Photo by: David Silverman Photography

Bears win five-set thriller against Central Connecticut

9/17/2021 6:41:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

Three Bears finished with double-digit kills.

WEST HARTFORD, Conn – Brown earned a tough five-set win over Central Connecticut State on Friday (Sept. 17) to start its weekend at Hartford. Three Bears finished with double-figure kills in the win.

Sophia Miller led the way for Brown with 21 kills and hit .356. Kayla Griebl added 16 kills, hitting .333 and Kate Sheire finished with 12 kills. Beau Vanderlaan had nine kills while hitting .368 as the team hit .300 overall for the match.

"When our system works it is very effective," said head coach Ahen Kim. "It is high risk and high reward, but when it works we see results like this. When your team hits over .300 that is credit to your setter for doing a great job."

Kristin Sellers led the way for the offense with 48 assists and was one of three Bears to post a double-double. Griebl and Miller also posted double-doubles, collecting 11 digs each. Victoria Vo led the way on defense with 17 digs.

"Regardless of how we got to the moment this was something the team needed," said Kim. "To go to five sets and come out victorious was important. Now that we have seen it and been successful in it,we can take this forward for the rest of the season."

Brown (5-3) came out firing, hitting .417 in the first set, committing just three errors and collecting 13 kills. A 6-0 start to the match put the Bears out front and they never looked back, getting up by as much as 11 at 21-10 after a kill from Miller. Kills by Sellers and Greibl ended the set with Brown up 25-15.

The Bears fell behind early in set two but blocks by Vanderlaan and Miller helped spark a run that moved the score from 5-6 to 10-7 in favor of the Bears. Later in the set, back-to-back kills from Miller put Brown up 19-11 and another block by the duo of Vanderlaan and Sellers extended the lead to 21-11.

After hitting at least .300 in the first two sets, Brown's offense cooled in the third and fourth sets as Central Connecticut (3-8) climbed back into the match. After holding the Blue Devils to .042 hitting in the first set and .028 in the second, Central Connecticut hit .346 in the third and .324 in the fourth.

The third set was back-and-forth being tied at 13 but Central Connecticut scored seven of the next nine points. Down 20-15, Brown picked up four-straight points to climb back to 20-18 but multiple attack errors allowed CCSU to score the next five points and win the sets 25-18.

Brown found itself down 11-7 in the fourth but fought its way back to a 19-17 lead after kills by Miller and Vanderlaan. The set went back-and-forth with Brown fighting off set points at 24-23 and 25-24 but two points from Central Connecticut gave the Blue Devils a 27-25 set win to tie the match.

Playing in its first five-set match of the season, a kill by Miller put Brown up 7-3. After a run by Central Connecticut, the set ended up tied at 11. Brown's next two points were matched by the Blue Devils but, tied at 13, Vanderlaan earned a kill and Griebl picked up a kill of her own to end the match.

The Bears will play two more matches on Saturday (Sept. 18), facing off against Sacred Heart and Hartford.