UMaine shows off diversity

ORONO – Sue Medley entered the volleyball preseason saying that this year, things would be different. This year, her Bears wouldn’t rely entirely on standout junior setter Cheryl Elliott.

This year, she said, they’d be more diverse.

When Elliott was suspended for this weekend’s Sea-Sun Opener Invitational for an undisclosed violation of team rules, Medley had a chance to test her hypothesis.

She still used a two-setter system on Friday night – sophomore Carmen Gabriel and freshman Ashley Marble shared duties as the team’s quarterback. And Medley was right: The diverse Bears topped the University of Ottawa 3-1 in a best-of-five match.

Maine won 31-29, 30-27, 23-30, 30-23 in a match against a Canadian team that won’t count in its NCAA statistics. The Bears posted the win in front of an enthusiastic crowd of about 900 fans, many of whom were UMaine freshmen who left an orientation event at Alfond Stadium and stopped by Memorial Gym.

Medley said she considered – briefly – using Gabriel as the lone setter in a 5-1 offense. But after 10 minutes of practice on Friday, she decided to start Marble as well.

“I knew she’d be ready to go tonight. She’s got a long way to go, but I thought she handled herself pretty well tonight,” Medley said.

Marble, a former basketball and volleyball star at Woodland High School, finished with 18 assists and was excited to play an important role in her collegiate debut.

“It felt great. I’ve watched a lot of volleyball games here, last year especially, and the crowd that was here was unbelievable. They were really into it,” Marble said. “It was just a high. I came out, and was like, ‘Yes! I get to play, I’m wearing a Maine uniform, and starting. I was lucky.”

Gabriel was one of the stars for UMaine, piling up 13 kills on 42 swings as the right-side hitter when Marble was setting, and also handing out a match-high 30 assists.

Many of those assists came on quick sets to 5-foot-11 middle blocker Claire Poliquin, who was virtually unstoppable one-on-one. Poliquin, a leaper who has high jumped 5-8 in track, converted on 15 of 30 attacks, including seven of nine to blow open the decisive fourth game.

“Some times Claire is our go-to player,” Gabriel said. “If we’re feeding the outside and it’s not working out, [we do] whatever it takes to get Claire the ball because she’ll put it away 99 percent of the time.”

Poliquin said the middle attack came around as the match progressed.

“We took their free balls and just made a good pass,” Poliquin said. “I only had one blocker up, so I had an option and was just able to put the ball down.”

Freshman Leah Guidinger led the Bears with 19 kills on 46 attempts.

The Gee Gees of Ottawa, who lost setter Amada Purdy to a knee injury early in the first game, were led by Elaine Belanger, who had 12 kills.