5th set dominance carries Tigers past Bethel

Coming off a strong 4-set win over Freed-Hardeman on Thursday, Georgetown took to the Davis-Reid Alumni Gym floor on Friday looking for its 2nd straight MSC win against Bethel. While the Tigers had 3 match points get away in the 4th set, the Tigers dominated set 5 for a 3-2 win over Bethel.

In set 1, both teams came out strong on offense and split the 1st 14 points. Georgetown then went on a mini-run of 4 straight thanks to consecutive Makena Walker kills and Bethel attack errors. The Tigers would grow the lead to as much as 7 in the set, and never trailed again, en route to a 25-21 win after hitting .361 in the opener.

The script was flipped in set 2 as Bethel worked efficiently and defended well. The Wildcats committed just 3 attack errors, while hitting .318. Despite having 6 more attack chances, the Tigers hit just .179 in the set. Bethel cruised to a 25-18 win to level the match.

Set 3 proved Georgetown's time to up its own defending. The Tigers limited Bethel to just 6 kills in the set and a hit number of -.053. While Georgetown's offense wasn't as crisp as the opening set, the Tigers rode that defense to a 25-20 win in the set and a 2-1 match lead.

The 4th set was one of runs throughout. Georgetown had 5 scoring runs of more than 1 point, while Bethel had 7 such runs. Georgetown worked its way to a 23-18 lead, giving the crowd the sense of the end. Bethel answered with 3 straight to get within 23-21, leading to a Georgetown timeout. Gareth Bruce smashed a ball out of the timeout to bring Georgetown to that 1st match point. With its collective back against the wall, Bethel stunned everyone with 5 straight points to take the 4th, 26-24, and push the match to the 5th set.

It proved to be the final threat from the Wildcats. After the first 2 points in the 5th were split, Georgetown went on an 11-2 run to take a commanding 12-3 lead. Bethel fought back to an extent but it was too late. Olivia Recktenwald put the final exclamation on a dominant 5th set that went Georgetown's way, 15-8.

Olivia Mitchell led the offense with 13 kills. Gareth Bruce, Constanca Rosas, and Makena Walker all tallied 11 each. The setter trio of Ines Marques (27), Ivona Zarin (19), and Viannie Kazan (11) combined for 57 assists. Reese Speed was stellar on the back line with 30 digs.

The Tigers next hit the road on Tuesday against Lindsey Wilson with an 8:00pm ET start time.