ST. CHARLES, Mo. - The Lindenwood Men's Volleyball team (10-2, 4-1 MIVA) completed a reverse sweep over #12 McKendree on Thursday night to pick up their fourth win in the MIVA and improved to a perfect 8-0 inside Hyland Arena in 2026.
Luke Kraft led all hitters with a match-high 21 kills in the victory over the Bearcats, while
Zach Solomon posted a match-high 49 assists. Solomon and Kraft also combined for eight of Lindenwood's 11 service aces to help the Lions improve to 4-2 against ranked opponents this season.
McKendree took the opening set 25-15 as the Bearcats hit .500 in the first set and used a 9-1 run in the middle of the set thanks to four service aces to grab the 1-0 lead.
Luke Kraft and
Brendan Louthain had seven of Lindenwood's 11 kills in the first set, but the big run by McKendree was too much to overcome in the first frame. In set two, the Lions had an early 3-0 run behind kills from
Owen Walsh and
Caden Whiteside to grab a 10-9 lead, but similar to the first set, the Bearcats used a 7-1 run in the middle of the set to grab a 16-11 lead midway through set two. The Lions cut the deficit to one late in the set by a score of 23-22 as Kraft added two more kills and a service ace, but McKendree held on to win set two by a score of 25-23 to take a two set lead.
In the third set, the Lions started on a 9-3 run as
Luke Kraft,
Brendan Louthain, and
Zach Solomon each picked up a service ace and both Louthain and Kraft combined for three kills early on to force an early Bearcat timeout. McKendree battled back and cut the Lindenwood lead to 12-9, but
Ty Baumgarth had back-to-back kills to extend the lead out to five at 14-9, and both
Aidan Akkawi and Kraft picked up two kills each to give the Lions an 18-16 advantage late in the set. With the third set tied at 18, the Lions had their second big run of the set to take a 22-19 lead behind two service errors from the Bearcats and another kill from Kraft. Akkawi would end the third set with two straight kills to give Lindenwood the 25-23 lead and forced a fourth set.
The Lions would have to dig deep in set four as McKendree opened up a 12-9 lead almost halfway through the set, but Lindenwood eventually grabbed the lead late as
Zach Solomon and
Brendan Louthain stuffed McKendree at the net to give them their first lead of the set by a score of 19-18.
Ty Baumgarth and
Owen Walsh would pick up massive kills late in the fourth set and the Lions took set four by a score of 25-22 to even the match at two sets apiece and forcing a winner-take-all fifth set.
In the final set, both teams traded the first several points as the score was 8-7 in favor of McKendree at the halfway point. Coming out of the break,
Owen Walsh picked up a solo block with Lindenwood trailing by one to tie the set at nine, and gave the Lions momentum over the final six points.
Luke Kraft evened the score at 10-10 and 12-12 to add two more kills to his match total, and gave the Lions the lead at 13-12 behind his fourth service ace of the match. The Bearcats tied the set at 13 on the next point, but Lindenwood ended the set on a 2-0 run behind kills from
Brendan Louthain and Kraft to complete the reverse sweep over McKendree and took the final set by a score of 15-13 to win the match 3-2.
After the Bearcats hit .500 and .333 in the first two sets, the Lions held them to hitting percentages of .214 and .240 in sets three and four en route to LU's first five set win of the 2026 season. The Lions also recorded their second highest total for digs in a single match this season with 38, and were led in digs by
Zach Solomon who had nine and
Lincoln Geist who had eight.
The Lions will now hit the road for their next four matches and will return to action next Friday and Saturday at Fort Valley State. First serve from Fort Valley, GA is set for 5 p.m. CT for both matches.
