Volleyball: Ottoville defeats P-G in four sets

OTTOVILLE – Pandora-Gilboa kept attacking Ottoville’s front line.

And more times than not, the Big Green had an answer.

In Tuesday’s key Putnam County League volleyball matchup between those two teams, Ottoville managed to slip out with a hard-fought four-set victory over P-G – 27-25, 23-25, 25-22, 25-19 at L.W. Heckman Gymnasium.

Ottoville improved to 16-2 overall and 3-1 in the PCL, while P-G slipped to 10-5 in all matches played and 1-3 in league action.

In Tuesday’s four sets combined, the score was tied 27 times, including 10 times in the opening set.

“We knew, coming into this game, that they’re a real scrappy team,” Ottoville coach Alexis Lautzenheiser said about P-G. “They pick up a lot of balls. They’re one of the scrappiest teams that we will play all year. So, we knew, coming in, that we needed to match that. I thought we did a pretty good job of doing that. We were kind of up and down, but overall, we were able to put the ball down and were able to get it to where we needed to. I thought we did a good job of mixing everything up. We competed well with them.”

Leading the way for Ottoville on Tuesday was senior Carly Thorbahn with 18 kills, 16 digs and four aces. Sophomore Kendall Schnipke had 19 kills. Sophomore Briley Wertenberger had six kills and nine digs. Senior libero Jocelyn Langhals had 28 digs. Junior Adeline Miller served up six aces and hammered five kills. Senior Erica Thorbahn recorded five kills and 13 digs for the Big Green.

“We have girls all across the net that we can go to in any given instance,” Lautzenheiser said. “That’s what is nice about coaching this team – they’re all very versatile. So, I really enjoy that.”

For P-G, junior Corrin Luginbill knocked down 18 kills, while junior Nevaeha Alvarado had eight kills. Ava Huffman, the junior libero for the Rockets, had 28 digs on the night.

The Rockets stayed in the hunt in all four sets on Tuesday.

“We have certain rotations that we get stuck in, and we have a hard time getting out of those,” P-G coach Melissa Diller said. “The difference in some of those sets was the mistakes we made. We just need to clean those up, get past them and move forward. It’s a learning curve for our girls in competitive games. When we get to the end, we have to learn to finish those (close matches).”

Ottoville 3, Pandora-Gilboa 1

Kills – Ottoville: Kendall Schnipke 19; P-G: Corrin Luginbill 18

Digs – Ottoville: Jocelyn Langhals 28; P-G: Ava Huffman 28

Aces – Ottoville: Adeline Miller 6; P-G: Peyton Diller 2

Records: Ottoville 16-2, 3-1 PCL; P-G 10-5, 1-3 PCL