New Prairie has gone 8-2 against Mishawaka Marian recently and they'll look to pad the win column further on Thursday. The New Prairie Cougars will take on the Mishawaka Marian Knights at 7:00 p.m. Both come into the match bolstered by wins in their previous matches.
It was a proper cat-fight when New Prairie faced off against South Bend Riley on Thursday. New Prairie was the clear victor by a 3-0 margin over South Bend Riley. The win made it back-to-back victories for the Cougars.
The 3-0 score doesn't show just how dominant New Prairie was: they took every set by at least 13 points. Once all was said and done, the final score wound up at 25-12, 25-10, 25-12.
New Prairie couldn't miss and finished the game having scored on 47.1% of their attack attempts. The last time their hitting percentage was this high was back in October of 2023.
Meanwhile, Mishawaka Marian was able to grind out a solid victory over Fairfield on Tuesday, taking the game 3-1.
The match was exciting from start to finish, as three sets needed extra rallies to gain a two-point lead. The match finished with set scores of 27-25, 25-19, 26-28, 26-24.
Mishawaka Marian's success was spearheaded by the efforts of Annie Verslype, who had 13 digs and six aces, and Bri Lundy, who had five digs and ten assists. That's the most aces Verslype has posted in her last seven games.
New Prairie pushed their record up to 15-8 with the win, which was their fifth straight at home. As for Mishawaka Marian, they have been performing well recently as they've won 12 of their last 16 matchups, which provided a nice bump to their 16-10 record this season.
Here's a few offensive stats to keep an eye on ahead of Thursday's contest: New Prairie has really dialed in their serving this season, having averaged 6.3 aces per game. However, it's not like Mishawaka Marian struggles in that department as they've been averaging 7.8. Given these competing strengths, it'll be interesting to see how their clash plays out.
New Prairie might still be hurting after the 3-0 loss they got from Mishawaka Marian when the teams last played back in October of 2023. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Mishawaka Marian's Jenna VanBruaene, who had 35 digs and ten assists. Now that New Prairie knows the damage she can cause, will they be able to stop her this time? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
