Ohio Valley Conference

ST. CHARLES, Mo. - Lindenwood women's volleyball (11-7, 5-1 OVC) handed Tennessee Tech their first Ohio Valley Conference loss of the season after a 3-0 sweep inside Hyland Arena on Thursday night. The Lions held TTU to a .099 hitting percentage, their lowest of the season.

Right-side Autumn Bax hit for a season-high .593 with a team-high 17 kills. She has now hit for double-digit kills in her last four matches. Nyah Wilson also contributed 12 kills in the sweep while adding 11 digs defensively. Wilson also picked up her 800th kill against the Golden Eagles.

Allie Otten helped the Lions to a .278 team hitting percentage with 51 total kills. The graduate student setter had 41 assists in three sets while adding four kills, two blocks and 11 digs for her 12th double-double of the season.

Lindenwood had four Lions in double-digits in digs including a team-high 17 by libero Jessie Seidel. Seidel was honored before the match for becoming the first Lion to reach 2,000 career digs. Dana Grib also added 11 digs. LU had eight total blocks including five from Ashley Geluck. Rebecca Janke also had two blocks and nine kills in the win.

The first set saw the Lions jump out to an 11-1 run with a huge crowd as the women's volleyball team was hosting their National Mental Health Day match. TTU crawled back into it, but Lindenwood took the first 25-19 after hitting .341 with 16 kills. Bax led the way with five kills while Otten added 12 assists.

Tennessee Tech kept it tight for most of the second set which saw five ties. After a Lindenwood timeout at the 17-17 mark, LU went on a 8-1 run to close out the second set. Bax and Wilson combined for 11 kills in the set. TTU hit only .029 in the second with seven attack errors.

Thursday's sweep came to a close in the third after Lindenwood had 19 kills while hitting .275 en route to a 25-23 set victory. It marked only the second time this season that the Golden Eagles suffered a loss and the first time in OVC play. Janke led the Lions in the third with seven kills as LU improved to 5-1 to start conference play.

WESTERN ILLINOIS 3, EASTERN ILLINOIS 1
MACOMB, Ill. - The Western Illinois Volleyball team picked up a crucial win tonight in four sets over in-state rival Eastern Illinois to snap their three-match losing streak. Keyana Cruse finished with a match-high 23 kills to go along with a hitting percentage of .392 and Maggie Craker set a new season-high for assists tonight finishing the match with 53.As a team, the Leathernecks had a hitting percentage of .280. On the defensive end, Karli Wenzel had a match-high 20 digs and WIU would finish the match with 76 digs as a team (19 DIG/S). 

Set one was back-and-forth the entire way with the biggest lead being three throughout the entire set.  The Leathernecks would tie the set seven different times thanks to kills by Grace Nichols, Elizabeth Ziegler, Brittany Wulf, and Julianna Schmidt. The Panthers would end the set on a 3-1 run to take the set by a score of 26-24.

In set two, the Leathernecks dominated the Panthers. WIU jumped out to an 11-4 lead to start the set and continued to have success against EIU going up by as much as 14 at one point during the set. Keyana Cruse would have the first three kills to start the second set for the Leathernecks, but the offense would be balanced the rest of the set. Back-to–back-to-back kills by Grace Nichols, Elizabeth Ziegler, and Brittany Wulf gave WIU a commanding 13-6 lead. Julianna Schmidt would get a kill later on in the set to put the Leathernecks up 10 and WIU would go on to take the second set by a score of 25-12. 

Set three saw WIU once again take a commanding lead to start the set. The Leathernecks started the set on a 16-5 run to start the third set thanks to five kills from Keyana Cruse, which highlighted the big run to start the set. The Panthers would not go down without a fight as they would go on a run of their own to cut the deficit to 17-10. A Keyana Cruse kill would end that run and she would go on to have eight kills in the set as the Leathernecks would win the set by a score of 25-17.

Set four was another back-and-forth battle between the two squads with both teams making runs throughout the set. A 10-3 run by EIU put the Panthers in front by a score of 13-10 in the middle of the fourth set. The Leathernecks would respond with an 8-4 run of their own to take the lead at 18-17. Elizabeth Ziegler and Julianna Schmidt would go back-to-back-to-back to regain the lead for WIU. The set would stay close the rest of the way until back-to-back kills late in the set by Brittany Wulf and Elizabeth Ziegler would give WIU the set four victory by a score of 26-24.