ST. CHARLES, Mo. – The Lindenwood women's volleyball team (16-3, 6-1 OVC) pounced back into the win column with a 3-1 win over Southern Indiana (7-10, 2-3 OVC) at Hyland Arena on Friday evening.
The Lions never trailed through the contest's first two sets, holding off the Screaming Eagles 25-21 in the opening frame before sprinting to a dominant 25-16 in the second set. After the first two frames,
Susanna Beretti and
Kylee Richey were already in double digit kills with 10 terminations apiece, with
Lauren Ortwerth trailing closely behind with nine kills.
Lindenwood fell behind for the first time at the beginning of the third set, and despite overcoming the early deficit and holding three separate two-point advantages in the set, were unable to complete the sweep as USI outlasted the Lions in extra points for a 27-25 win that extended the match.
However, the Lions regrouped for a strong fourth set performance, leading the frame by as many as seven points before eventually claiming a decisive 25-19 victory to clinch the match.
Kylee Richey had a strong night in the middle for Lindenwood, racking up 13 kills on a .409 attack percentage while adding seven blocks for season highs in both categories.
Lauren Ortwerth matched Richey with 13 kills while
Susanna Beretti ended the night with12 kills on a .333 hitting percentage.
Meanwhile,
Ashley Geluck turned in another strong performance with 11 kills on a team-leading .478 hitting percentage, while
Autumn Bax also reached double digits with 10 terminations in the match.
Kaci Johnson handed out 54 assists – her second highest total in a single match this season – as Lindenwood finished the match with a team hitting percentage of .310, eclipsing the .300 mark for the seventh time this season.
Johnson also led the team with 15 digs for a double-double, her seventh of the season, while
Dana Grib anchored the LU back row with 14 digs.
Quotable
"USI is a team that serves tough and I thought we did a good job on our serve receive. Kaci did a good job of spreading the ball around. With ten players with 10 plus kills, that's about as balanced as you can be," said Lindenwood head coach
Will Condon.
"I thought we did a good job of applying what we did in practice. We are at the point in the season where there are no more secrets so we have to be willing to expand what we can do to keep our opponents off balance."
Next Up
Lindenwood concludes their weekend against Southern Indiana on Saturday at 2:00 p.m.
