Ivy Slide Continues Despite Tough Play

A tough season continued to get tougher this weekend as the women’s volleyball team dropped two more matches to top Ivy League opponents. The Crimson fell, 3-1 (25-30, 32-30, 30-20, 30-19), to Penn on Friday and 3-1 (30-19, 30-19, 27-30, 30-15) to Princeton on Saturday in a pair of road contests.

The Crimson (7-17) is now 2-10 in the Ivy League and seventh in the standings. Princeton sits atop the league with a perfect 11-0 conference record, and Penn is close behind, in second place at 9-2.

Both matches were characterized by stretches of competitive play by Harvard, but in both cases, the Crimson was eventually overrun by its opponents.

PRINCETON 3, HARVARD 1

Entering Saturday’s match against Harvard, the Tigers had not lost a home match in Dillon Gym since 2005, and this weekend was no different. Top-ranked Princeton out-hit and out-blocked the Crimson en route to a convincing victory.

Poor hitting cost the Crimson the first game, as the squad recorded 11 errors and only nine kills for a -.053 hitting percentage. The Tigers, meanwhile, posted 16 kills on .225 hitting, and the result was a relatively easy victory in game one.

Both sides stepped it up in the second game, as Harvard recorded 17 kills and a .324 hitting percentage, but Princeton only posted one error and the result was the same—a 30-19 Tigers win.

The Crimson kept fighting, however, and was able to capitalize on a late run to take the third game by a score of 30-27. At one point, down 25-21, Harvard strung together six consecutive points to take a 27-25 lead. After a quick back and forth between the two sides, junior Kathryn McKinley put the game away with a kill.

“We really had to battle back in that third game to win it,” said senior outside hitter Laura Mahon. “We worked so hard.”

The fourth game was a black and orange blur, as the Tigers jumped out to a 7-0 lead and piled a 7-2 run on top of it to go up 14-2 in the early going. The two teams traded points back and forth from that point on, but the score was never really close.

“Princeton had our number,” Mahon said.

Mahon recorded 17 kills in the match and moved into fourth place on the Crimson’s all-time kill list with 1,057 while also adding 14 digs.

Sophomore libero Katherine Kocurek led the defensive effort, notching a team-high 17 digs, and fellow sophomore Lily Durwood distributed 44 assists.

PENN 3, HARVARD 1

The Crimson came out firing Friday in Philadelphia, and, aided by a plethora of attack errors by the Quakers, was able to claim the first game by a score of 30-25.

Penn offset an impressive 21 kills in the first game with 11 errors, good for a .192 hitting percentage. Harvard managed 11 kills with only three errors and hit .222.

The Crimson broke open a 17-17 tie with a five-point run on the strength of Durwood’s serve.

Captain Suzie Trimble pointed to the first game as an example of some of the team’s finest play so far this season.

“Our defense was awesome,” she said. “We were digging everything they brought to us, and then, when we were transitioning back to offense, we were being smart with the ball and putting it in places where they couldn’t get it.”

The strong play continued for the Crimson in the second game, as the squad traded points back and forth with the Quakers to a 20-20 tie. From there, Harvard built a 25-21 lead and looked poised to go out to a 2-0 lead.

But Penn fought back, and an error by Kocurek allowed the Quakers to within one at 26-25.

Two Harvard kills, one by Trimble and one by sophomore Chelsea Ono Horn, got the Crimson back on track, and the squad soon found itself leading 29-27, one point away from clinching the second game.

It was not to be, however, as Penn’s Kathryn Turner recorded three kills over the next six points and the Quakers stole an extended game two by the score of 32-30.

From there, the match momentum swung drastically away from the Crimson, and Penn easily captured games three and four.

“It was very frustrating,” Trimble said. “Momentum is definitely huge in any volleyball game, so that definitely played a role.”

Trimble, who continues to play through injuries, notched 11 kills against the Quakers and is tied for the team lead with fellow senior Mimi Hanley. Kocurek led all players with 24 digs.

The Crimson will close out its season with a final pair of conference home games this coming weekend in Lavieties Pavilion.

The team hopes to finish strong against two opponents, Columbia and Cornell, that it believes are beatable.

“We’re in good place for next weekend coming in,” Mahon said. “We beat Columbia once, and we beat Cornell in points last time, so it’s just a question of ekeing out the games.”

—Staff writer Douglas A. Baerlein can be reached at baerlein@fas.harvard.edu.