MARTIN, Tenn.—Morehead State volleyball survived a comeback by UT Martin and won set five to a take a 3-2 (25-23, 25-15, 19-25, 22-25, 15-12) Ohio Valley Conference win Saturday afternoon at Skyhawk Fieldhouse.
The Eagles (9-4, 2-0 OVC) offensive attack was potent, hitting .266 as a team with three players in double figure kills.
Kaitlin Craven’s 22 kills led MSU while
Holly Evans had 16 and
Aryn Bohannon had 15 kills. Evans hit .432 and Craven hit .333 and Kirstie Branger tallied a career-high 58 assists.
Morehead took an early led in set one and pushed it out to seven at 16-9, but UT Martin closed the gap an pulled within one at 22-21 on a kill by Ashley Doherty. After a MSU timeout the teams traded points , but kills but Evans and
Emma Keough finished set one in Morehead’s favor, 25-23. The Eagles took another early lead in set two, courtesy of seven straight serves by Craven. MSU did not let the Skyhawks back in the game this time, pushing the lead to nine at 20-11 on a kill by Evans. MSU closed out the set by scoring five of the final eight points to win set two 25-15.
UT Martin (6-5, 1-1 OVC) avoided the sweep in set three by taking a 5-4 lead and rolling off five straight to take a 10-4 lead. Morehead slowly chipped away at the lead, pulling within two at 20-18 on an ace by Keough. The Skyhawks scored the final three points however to take set three 25-19. Set four was a back-and-forth game most of the way, but UT Martin slowly pulled away at the end of the game and took a 25-22 win to even the match score.
The deciding set was narrowly in MSU’s favor at 12-11, but kills from Evans,
Annie Gruenschlaeger and Allison McElveen gave Morehead three of the final four points to capture the match win.
Defensively,
Kristina Schoo had 24 digs and Brangers had 15.
Lindsey Ruddell had 14 digs and Cravens tallied 10 to turn back the Skyhawk attacks. Gruenschlaeger had six blocks and Evans had four.
The Skyhawks had four players with double digit kills, led by Jenna Kragt’s 15 kills and a .538 hitting percentage.
Morehead returns to action Thursday at arch rival Eastern Kentucky at 7 p.m.
