Dancing Again! Volleyball Sweeps Yale To Clinch Return Trip To The NCAA Championships

Saturday, November 18

New Haven, Conn.

7:00 PM

Princeton University

18-7, 10-4Ivy

Yale

16-8, 10-4Ivy

Princeton

Yale

Photo by: Ivy League

Dancing Again! Volleyball Sweeps Yale To Clinch Return Trip To The NCAA Championships

November 18, 2017 | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

The start may not have been pretty, but the ending was as magical as any of the Tigers could have hoped.

The Princeton women's volleyball team overcame a rocky start to sweep Yale in the Ivy League playoff match Saturday night in New Haven. With the win, Princeton has clinched the league's automatic bid to the NCAA Championships, which will mark the seventh time the Tigers have made the NCAA postseason, and the second in as many years.

How rocky was that start? After 24 points, Yale led 17-7 in seemed in cruise control for a 1-0 lead.

A 4-0 run off the serve of freshman Lauren Flaming, and then a 5-0 run on classmate's Alexa Underwood serve, got the Tigers back in the set, and Princeton never let that momentum wane. A kill by Nnenna Ibe set up a set point, and sophomore Natasha Skov stunned the Yale crowd with a kill that gave the Tigers a 1-0 lead.

From there, Ivy League Player of the Year Maggie O'Connell took over. She ended the match with 12 kills and two blocks to lead Princeton to a 25-23, 25-18, 25-23 victory. Ibe had eight kills on 19 swings without any errors (.421), while Skov added eight kills of her own. All-Ivy setter Jessie Harris had 32 assists and paced the offense to a .230 attack percentage against the league's top-rated defense.

GOING DANCING! Princeton will return to the NCAA Championships following a 3-0 sweep of Yale!!! 7th trip to the NCAAs for the Ivy champs! pic.twitter.com/F0kxakcR10
— PrincetonVolley (@PrincetonVolley) November 19, 2017

Senior co-captain Maddie Huber led the defense with a match-high 19 digs in the final Ivy match of her career, while fellow co-captain Kelly Matthews added nine. Carolina Sklaver added seven kills and two blocks, while Devon Peterkin recorded seven kills and 14 digs.

Princeton, which pushed #10 BYU in two tough sets during a highly competitive 2016 NCAA Championships first-round match last year, will find out its opponent during the NCAA Selection Show, which will be shown the Sunday after Thanksgiving.