FRIDAY'S SCORES
@Eastern Kentucky 3, Tennessee State 1 (25-16, 19-25, 25-21, 25-23)
Belmont 3, @Morehead State 2 (22-25, 26-28, 25-14, 26-24, 15-10)
@Austin Peay 3, Tennessee State 1 (18-25, 26-24, 25-17, 25-21)
@Murray State 3, Jacksonville State 0 (27-25, 25-20, 25-15)
Southeast Missouri 3, @Eastern Illinois 2 (25-20, 25-18, 18-25, 20-25, 15-12)
@SIUE 3, UT Martin 2 (21-25, 14-25, 25-22, 26-24, 15-13)
EASTERN KENTUCKY 3, TENNESSEE STATE 1
RICHMOND, Ky. - Eastern Kentucky beat Tennessee State 3-1 on Friday at McBrayer Arena.
EKU won by scores of 25-16, 19-25, 25-21 and 25-23.
Senior Alexis Plagens led the Colonels (18-11, 8-3 OVC) with a match best 16 kills while adding three blocks. Rachel Vick finished with 10 kills with six blocks. Abbey Cvelbar contributed 38 assists. Dena Ott and Julia Mindlina totaled 20 digs each.
In the first set Eastern won 25-16 but lost the second set, 25-19. In the third set EKU led by nine, 23-14, after a kill from Plagens. The Tigers went on a 7-1 run, reaching a three point difference, 24-21, before the set ended 25-21 with a TSU attack error.
In the fourth set the Colonels took a six point lead, 20-14, on a kill by Plagens. However, Tennessee State battled back and took the lead at 22-21 after a Naomi Wells kill. Eastern ended the match with a 4-1 run, 25-23.
EKU had an edge in service aces, 8-3. Tennessee State had one more kill, 49-48, but the Colonels had five fewer errors.
The Tigers’ Arijana Anderson led the team with 14 kills. Wells and Haley Hampton contributed 10 kills. Ileanushka Maldonado led both teams with a high of 27 digs and Samantha Beltran had 39 assists.
BELMONT 3, MOREHEAD STATE 2
MOREHEAD, Ky. - Belmont volleyball rallied to defeat Morehead State in five sets (22-25, 28-26, 25-14, 26-24, 15-10) Friday evening as the Bruins came back from two sets down to start the weekend with a victory over the Eagles.
Belmont (12-13, 9-2 OVC) dropped the first two sets to the host Eagles in a similar manner as MSU tallied the final three points in both stanzas as Morehead State (1-24, 1-10 OVC) jumped out to the 2-0 advantage on the match.
Down but certainly not out, the Bruins began their comeback with an easy victory in the third set, 25-14.
BU was in danger of dropping the match in the fourth as Belmont trailed MSU, 23-20, before the Bruins tallied three consecutive points to tie up the set.
The two teams once again stood knotted at 24 until Belmont used a pair of MSU hitting errors to take the set, 26-24, and extend the match into a deciding fifth stanza.
The Bruins completed their comeback attempt in the final set as BU's hitters recorded a .421 attack percentage and the Bruins surged to a victory, 15-10.
Arianna Person (Lenexa, Kan.) led the Bruins on the evening as the freshman had a sucessful return to the Belmont lineup with a double-double of 16 kills and 13 digs. The outside hitter also added four blocks and three service aces on the contest.
Three other Bruins also finished with double figure kills as Alex Martin (Ooltewah, Tenn.) used a .375 hitting percentage to notch 12 kills off 24 swings while Jocelyn Youngdahl (Stillwater, Minn.) and Maddison Croft (Edwardsville, Ill.) tallied 11 and 10 kills respectively.
Setter Emma Price (Fort Mill, S.C.) finished with a match-best 55 assists as the Bruins recorded a .250 hitting percentage compared to MSU's .203 clip.
AUSTIN PEAY 3, TENNESSEE TECH 1
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. - Junior Samantha Strother led all hitters with 15 kills and Austin Peay State University’s volleyball team rallied to post a four-set victory (18-25, 26-24, 25-17, 25-21) against Tennessee Tech, Friday night, at the Dunn Center.
Austin Peay (12-15, 6-5 OVC) got off to a quick start in the opening set, leading 6-2. Tennessee Tech broke the Lady Govs momentum and used a 7-0 run, including three Kellie Williams kills, to build a 12-9 advantage. The Lady Govs could not recover and ultimately trailed by six points before falling 25-18.
The second set was more closely fought with 12 ties and two lead changes. The first lead change came when Tennessee Tech notched back-to-back kills to take a 2-1 lead. The Golden Eagles lead would reach six points, 14-8, after an Austin Peay error.
From there the Lady Govs used an 8-2 run, spurred by kills from five different hitters, to tie the set 16-16. That began a series where the teams traded points, with the bulk of the 12 ties occurring in the final stretch. Austin Peay would fend off a set point with a Jada Stotts kill then an Aunbrey Marsellis block gave APSU its first set point, which it immediately converted with another Stotts kill, 26-24.
Austin Peay rode the momentum of its come-back win to post a wire-to-wire victory in the third set. The Lady Govs broke out to a 9-1 lead, Stotts recording three kills and two service aces. Tennessee Tech would close to within five points, 21-16, but an Austin Peay timeout and a Hillary Plybon kill ended the threat. The Lady Govs scored the final three points to secure the 25-17 win.
The fourth set was close early, with four ties in the opening 14 points, as Austin Peay charged out to a 4-1 lead only to watch Tennessee Tech use a pair of service aces to tie the set 5-5. The Lady Govs gained breathing room again with a 3-0 run to build a 10-7 lead. They would maintain that lead until late in the set when the Golden Eagles closed within a point, 20-19. But back-to-back kills by Marsellis and Slay stabilized APSU’s lead and they closed the frame with back-to-back kills by Strother and Plybon to win the match.
Strother’s 15 kills – she had seven in the tide-turning second set – were one shy of her career best and came while she hit .382. Marsellis chipped in a career-high tying 12 kills while Stotts (11 kills) and Plybon (10) also reached double-digit kill territory.
Austin Peay finished with 57 kills and a .213 attack percentage. However, the Lady Govs had 48 kills and hit .248 in the final three sets.
Cody Dodd led Tennessee Tech with 14 kills, but was limited to a .163 attack percentage. The Golden Eagles recorded 47 kills but posted just a .188 attack percentage.
SOUTHEAST MISSOURI 3, EASTERN ILLINOIS 2
CHARLESTON, Ill. - Eastern Illinois volleyball battled back from a two-set deficit to push Ohio Valley Conference rival Southeast Missouri to the limit on Friday (Oct. 31) night, but the Panther comeback fell short as EIU dropped the five-set thriller (25-20, 25-18, 18-25, 20-25, 15-12).
The tough loss moves the Panthers to 10-14 overall and 4-7 in league play as EIU still holds onto to eighth place in the conference standings. The Redhawks, meanwhile, earned the regular-season sweep of the Panthers with the victory to improve to 10-15 and 6-5 in the OVC and tie for fifth place.
Junior Abby Saalfrank paced a trio of Panthers with double-digit kills as the right-side attacker drilled 20 put-downs off a .224 attack, while adding three blocks and posting a 21.5 point tally.
Fellow junior Chelse Lee and newcomer Allie Hueston both chipped in 15 kills of their own, while Hueston added four roofs and Lee registered three blocks as well.
Junior setter Marah Bradbury secured her 30th career double-double with a 55 assist, 19 dig performance.
In other defensive numbers, redshirt freshman Josie Winner led all Panthers at the net with six stuffs, while junior libero Stephanie Wallace upped 23 SEMO attacks. Senior defensive and serving specialist Dakota Springer tied freshman Maria Brown with 18 digs, while senior Kelsey Brooke chipped in 14 ups of her own.
Seniors Kelsey Keeve and Andrea Baylin led SEMO with respective 14 and 13 kill numbers, as both also secured double-digit digs as well at 19 and 18. The Panthers did hold the OVC's top attacker, junior Taylor Masterson to a zero hitting mark, while newcomer Nzingha Clarke's seven blocks paced all players on the court. Libero Jade Mortimer finished with 22 digs to lead her squad's backrow defensive.
Team-wise, the Panthers actually led their arch-rivals in nearly every statistical category, including holding the advantage in kills, attack, assists, digs, and points. SEMO just barely out-hit andout-blocked the Panthers, while also sporting one more ace.
Meeting for the 46th time, the contest featured 33 ties and 16 lead changes, as EIU found themselves down 0-2 early as SEMO rallied from an early Panther lead in the opening set to eventually win 25-20 thanks to an eight-to-one block advantage.
After both squads played evenly in the second frame through 18 points, the visitors would go on a 7-0 run to take the set, 25-18, as EIU hit zero in the frame.
Sets three and four went to EIU off respective 25-18 and 25-20 wins as the Panthers limited the Redhawks to negative attacks in both frames, while Eastern hit a match-best .303 in the third set.
The deciding set saw SEMO take the early 4-1 lead before the Panthers would slowly tie it up at 8-all thanks to a Redhawk miscue. From that point on, both squads played classic side-out ball with SEMO holding the one point advantage as Eastern could never get past an even score. At 11-all, SEMO would connect on three straight kills to pull ahead and eventually earn the 15-12 victory.
With the victory, SEMO now owns a 30-16 all-time series advantage over the Panthers.
MURRAY STATE 3, JACKSONVILLE STATE 0
MURRAY, Ky. - The Murray State volleyball team got their 11th sweep of the season Friday night against Jacksonville State 3-0 (27-25, 25-20, 25-25) at Racer Arena. The Racers are on an eight-game winning streak and atop the Ohio Valley Conference entering the final weeks of the season.
During the first set, MSU (19-4, 10-1 OVC) trailed Jacksonville State (16-12, 7-4 OVC) 17-19. Scottie Ingram turned in a kill and then a service ace to tie the score 19-19. Murray State never trailed again in the first set. Alyssa Lelm had a pair of kills and a service ace to give the team those extra points to take the first set 27-25.
In the second set, the Racers trailed early 7-6, but never trailed again after a point from Taylor Olden and an error by JSU. Jacksonville State tied the set 16-16. Murray State went on a 4 point run and took control 24-20. MSU went up 2-0 on a service ace from Sam Bedard.
Emily Schmahl, who came off the bench, gave the Racers their first three points off of kills to start the third set. The set was tied 5-5, but Murray State went on a 20-9 run to take the third set and the match.
Two Racers notched double-doubles during the match. Kristen Besselsen recorded 10 kills to go along with 10 digs, while Bedard turned in 43 assists and a match-high 14 digs. Olden matched her season-high with 19 kills to go along with seven digs and one service ace. Lelm added seven kills to the team while hitting .353. Ellie Lorenz dished out 12 digs along with two assists to help the team.
SIUE 3, UT MARTIN 2
EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. - SIUE volleyball made its biggest comeback of the season Friday night with a five-set victory over UT Martin at the Vadalabene Center.
The Cougars won their second straight match and improved to 11-15 overall and 3-8 in the Ohio Valley Conference. SIUE lost the first two sets 25-21 and 25-14 only to roar back in the next three sets 25-22, 26-24 and 15-13.
UT Martin, 10-15 overall and 3-8 in the OVC, came out strong with 20 of its 64 kills in the first set.
Allie Whimpey led four UT Martin players with double figures kills. She had 15 while Emily Keaton had 14, Madison Wessling recorded 13, and Alisha Erves added 11.
The team and coaching staff discussed what was going well and what wasn't between the second and third sets. Once the third set started, SIUE looked more like the team with the lead than a team down by two sets.
Torre led all players with 18 kills while Colclasure added a season-high 30 digs. Ramich led the team in hitting percentage at .467 with eight kills.
SIUE finished with 65 kills for the match and nine blocks. Torre led the Cougars with five blocks followed by four from Ashley Witt. Taylor Held and Emily Harrison joined Torre in double figures kills with 11 and 10, respectively.