OSHKOSH, Wis. - The Claremont-Mudd-Scripps volleyball team had two more lengthy battles on the second day of the Marty Petersen Invitational at Wisconsin-Oshkosh on Saturday, but fell on the short end of a 3-2 defeat to No. 10 WashU and a 3-1 defeat to No. 6 Wisconsin-Oshkosh. 

CMS, which also fell in five sets to No. 5 Emory yesterday on the first day of the tournament, drops to 3-3 overall on the season, with all three losses tight battles this weekend to top 10 teams.  

Set scores against WashU were 25-27, 25-23, 29-27, 7-25, 15-11 in favor of the Bears, and were 26-24, 22-25, 25-23, 25-23 for Wisconsin-Oshkosh. Including yesterday's 25-19, 20-25, 29-27, 24-26, 19-17 match against Emory, nine of the 14 sets CMS played at the Marty Petersen Invitational this weekend were decided by two points, including six that went to extra points. 

The outlier of the weekend was a 25-7 win for the Athenas against WashU on Saturday in the fourth set, which pushed it to a fifth. The Athenas jumped out to a 6-0 lead behind two kills and two aces from Brooke McKee, with Stella Gajar capping it off with a kill. With the score 15-6, CMS went on its second 6-0 run to go ahead 21-6, with Ari Clarkson starting it with a kill, Samantha Riter picking up an ace, Shae Delany earning a kill, and McKee picking up two kills around a Gajar solo block. 

WashU was able to regroup, though, and use a 5-0 run to go ahead 10-6 in the fifth. McKee stopped the run with a kill, but the teams alternated points until the Bears finished off a 15-11 win.

McKee finished with 24 kills on 70 swings with 19 digs, while Delany had 17 kills and 22 digs. Clarkson was also in double figures with 11 kills, while Mia Urosevic had 38 digs and Riter finished with 28 assists and 18 digs. 

In the Wisconsin-Oshkosh match, Delany had a kill to finish off a 25-22 win in the second set to level the match at one set apiece. The Athenas used a 4-0 run to surge ahead 23-17, which was started by two straight blocks from Gajar (the first with Clarkson and the second with McKee), and capped off by a Phoebe Shorney kill. McKee had a kill to make it 24-18, and after the Titans killed off four straight set points, Delany was able to finish it off. 

CMS led 23-22 in the third set, but Wisconsin-Oshkosh closed on a 3-0 run to take the lead two sets to one. The Athenas roared out to a 7-0 lead in the fourth set, behind two McKee aces, but the Titans were able to respond and go ahead 10-9. Solvej Eversoll had a block to tie the score 17-17, but Wisconsin-Oshkosh was able to go ahead 24-11. McKee killed off the first match point, and an error made it 24-23, but Grace Juergens had the match-winning kill for the hosts. 

McKee had 19 kills on 48 attempts, hitting .333, and added 13 digs, while Shorney had 13 kills. Riter had her second straight double-double with 28 assists and 14 digs, and Skye Dunn contributed 19 digs to the back row. 

CMS will be back in action next week when it travels to the Cal Lutheran Invitational.