Wheaton, Ill. -- Playing and hosting the program's first CCIW Tournament match since 2021, the Wheaton volleyball team took to the King Arena court on Tuesday night to face off against Carroll University in the quarterfinal stage of this year's competition. The Thunder are the #4 seed in the 2025 CCIW Championship and earned the right to host a first round contest by virtue of their 4-4 record in regular season conference action. The Pioneers defeated Wheaton in Waukesha last month but finished with a 3-5 mark in league play and had to settle for the tournament's #5 seed. The Thunder avenged that regular season defeat to their Wisconsin opponents tonight in a five-set thriller and claimed the program's first conference tournament victory since a 3-2 win over Carroll's state neighbor, Carthage College, in 2012. With this evening's result, Wheaton advances to Thursday's semifinal round, where it will travel to Bloomington to take on top-seeded Illinois Wesleyan University.
The Orange and Blue defeated Tuesday's visitors by a score of 3-2 in last year's clash in King Arena, and that outcome was repeated tonight, although Wheaton was not required to pull off a reverse sweep this time. The first set of this evening's match was a back-and-forth affair, with neither side building a lead of more than three points. Consecutive service aces from the newly-crowned CCIW Setter of the Week,
Lacey Higgins, (
pictured right)
gave Wheaton an early 4-2 advantage, but the Pioneers responded with back-to-back kills, and this set the tone for a competitive opening frame. The Thunder collected three-straight points to move in front at 11-8, but the guests proceeded to score five of the next six, and Wheaton did not regain the lead again after this sequence. A kill by
Paris Griffin gave the home side a glimmer of hope at 21-23, but Carroll notched the next two scores to close out a first-set win and pick up where it left off in Waukesha.
The second frame was one-way traffic, however, as the Thunder ended their four-set drought against the Pios in impressive fashion with a 25-15 result. Wheaton raced out to a 7-3 lead thanks to five kills and a pair of opposition attack errors and would hold this advantage for the remainder of the game. Carroll did well to pull back within one point in the middle of the set, but the Thunder rattled off five-straight points to stretch its lead to 17-11, and the rest of the set proved to be a formality to the delight of the sizable home crowd. Higgins and fellow senior
Jordan Benford each delivered a kill to punctuate Wheaton's stylish second game.
This set up what was always likely to be a key third set as the two sides wrestled for control of the match. Impressive defensive play and extended rallies populated the frame with the evenly-matched squads going blow-for-blow in search of a valuable 2-1 advantage. Carroll built an initial 6-3 edge in the game, but Wheaton put on a clinical stretch of three kills and two aces to turn the tables back on its visitor. The Pios would not lead again in the set from this point on, but they refused to go down without a fight and made the Thunder earn it the hard way. The teams exchanged ten consecutive points back and forth in the middle of the frame before Wheaton finally bagged three in a row to establish an 18-14 cushion. A kill by Benford and a Carroll attack error a few minutes later put the hosts on the brink at 24-20, but the #5 seed dug deep and rallied off four-straight points to quiet the King Arena audience and tie the score. In what proved to be a significant response in the course of the match, Wheaton shrugged off this stumble and registered the next two points via a Benford kill and a block by Griffin (
pictured left) and
Mary Hamann to secure a hard-fought 26-24 result.
But any assumptions of a third-straight set win for the fourth-seeded hosts were proved incorrect in the subsequent game, as the Pioneers once again showed their spirit and grit in notching a 25-23 victory to force a winner-take-all fifth set. This time it was Carroll's turn to flip a 2-0 deficit into a 4-2 lead at the start of the frame. But the Thunder's stout defensive organization helped them reel off five-consecutive points to build a 9-6 edge. Another Benford hammer in the middle of the game put Wheaton up 12-10, but the Pioneers tallied five of the following six points to provide a springboard for their survival. Carroll kept Wheaton at arm's length over the subsequent sequences and looked to be sailing towards a fourth-set victory at 22-18. But a service error opened the door for the home side, and the Thunder took four of the next five to tie the set at 23 apiece and put the pressure on the Waukesha outfit. The late rally came up just short for the Orange and Blue, however, as consecutive attack errors delivered the fourth frame to the Pioneers and confirmed that a close matchup on paper would indeed go the distance on the court.
With the King Arena crowd on the edge of their seats, Wheaton started the fifth game on a strong note with back-to-back kills, and this hinted at what was to come, as the home side hit an impressive .474 percentage and racked up ten kills in the decisive set. Carroll never led in the final frame, and the Thunder grabbed five of the last seven points of the night to close out a 15-11 set win and end the program's 13-year drought in the CCIW Tournament. In what is likely to be their final match together on their home court, the senior duo of Benford and Higgins combined five times in the fifth set to ensure that their team extended its noteworthy season and reached double-figures in home wins this fall.
Tuesday's contest was a high-quality spectacle from two sides that were picked to finish eighth and ninth in the CCIW in this year's preseason coaches' poll. Both programs left the floor with reasons to be proud of their performance, but Wheaton ultimately had too much for Carroll on the day. The Thunder tallied 68 kills to the Pioneers' 61, 12 service aces to Carroll's five, and 78 digs to the visitors' 75. But the Pios earned a 9-5 blocking advantage and finished the match with the superior hitting percentage of .251 through five sets to Wheaton's total mark of .239. Both squads registered their highest attacking percentages in the fifth set on Tuesday, proving that there was no dip in the quality of play as the match wore on.
The First Team All-Conference honoree Benford logged her second-consecutive 19-kill performance and a team-high 17 digs this evening, while Higgins earned two aces, two blocks, and a season-best 57 assists, the second-most in a single match by any conference player this year. Griffin posted a career-high 13 kills, Hamann led the team with four blocks, and
Grace Autry notched three aces and 16 digs in the win.
Ashton Major and
Meghan Shah were significant contributors, as well, with the former tallying 12 kills and two aces and the latter making a season-best 14 digs.
After celebrating tonight's landmark win, Wheaton will prepare for a difficult task against another team that won in straight sets in their regular season meeting. The Thunder will head to central Illinois on Thursday to face the regular season champions and third-ranked team in the country, Illinois Wesleyan University, in a 7 PM semifinal. The winner of that match will earn the right to play the winner of second-seeded Carthage and #3 Millikin in Saturday's Championship final.
