The Northwood University volleyball team showed Hillsdale College why it is the defending champions of the conference with a 3-0 sweep of the host Chargers Tuesday night.
The Timberwolves won the sets by scores of 25-7, 25-23 and 25-21. Hillsdale is now 14-11 overall and 9-5 in the GLIAC, and will host Upper Peninsula foes Northern Michigan and Michigan Tech this weekend.
Northwood's aggressive serving made the Chargers' serve receive game struggle to generate offense in the first set of the match. At one point, the Timberwovles scored 13 points in a row, running away with the set.
Hillsdale came out playing stronger in all aspects of the game in set two, and held a 23-22 lead late, only to see Northwood tally the set's final three points to eek out a 25-23 win.
Northwood also controlled most of set three, with the Chargers attempting a comeback on a couple of occasions. But Northwood's offense, led by 2012 GLIAC Player of the Year Juliia Pakhomenko, was too much for the team to handle.
Junior right-side hitter Kat Vael had a team-high seven kills, with a .300 hitting percentage for the Chargers. Senior Caitlin Kopmeyer moved from libero to outside hitter before the second set, and finished with six kills. Junior middle hitter lindsay Kostrzewa added six kills to the Charger attack.
Senior Sydney Lenhart played excellent defense in the third set and led the team with 14 digs.