Match 1
Led by Nyah Wilson’s 14 kills and Allie Otten’s reaching 3,000 career assists, Lindenwood women’s volleyball swept Tennessee Tech on Thursday. Otten became the third Lion ever to reach 3,000 assists. She also had 15 digs to notch her 15th double-double of the season. They upped their win streak to six games in a row and improved their record to 15-7 and 9-1 in the Ohio Valley Conference. Autumn Bax, Addy McAleer, and Faith Atkins all chipped in the win having nine, seven, and six kills respectively. Lindenwood was without their star front-line player Rebecca Janke. Lindenwood continued to play great defense holding Tennessee State to a .039 hit percentage in the match while hitting a respectable .276 themselves in the three-set sweep.
Lindenwood got off to a slow start in the first set finding themselves down 8-1 early before calling their first timeout to try and halt Tennessee State’s momentum. Halt the momentum they did, as Lindenwood stormed out of the timeout and found their stride riding the backs of kills from Bax, Ashley Geluck, Wilson, and Faith Atkins and found themselves ahead 16-13 forcing Tennessee State’s second timeout of the set. The Tigers would cut the deficit to 21-20, but that’s the closest they would get as Wilson closed out the set with three kills to give Lindenwood the 25-21 set one win. Wilson led the way with seven kills, and seven digs in the set and Bax added five kills and a block of her own. Lindenwood had 18 kills within the set and hit .304 within the set.
Lindenwood controlled set two from the jump and rode the good start to a 25-16 set two win. Addy McAleer led the way for the Lions with five kills, with Wilson chipping in with four of her own as well as four digs. Jessie Seidel chipped in with six digs of her own, and Otten had five to go along with 13 of her 34 assists in the match. Lindenwood continued to play spectacular defense holding the Tigers to a .119 hit percentage while hitting a match-high .341 hit percentage of their own.
With Lindenwood comfortably up 2-0 in the match, the Lions jumped out to an 8-1 start of their own and rode that to a third set and match-winning 25-14 victory. The sweep was the Lions sixth in OVC play and capitalized off Tennessee State errors as the Tigers had 12 hit errors in the set leading to a -.146 hit percentage. Lindenwood only hit .138 in the third set but it didn’t matter as they only committed five attack errors of their own. Wilson led the way with 3 kills in the set with Atkins and Bax each having two as the Lions cruised to yet another sweep of an OVC opponent.
Match 2
Coming off a three-set sweep on Thursday, Lindenwood kept it rolling with another sweep of Tennessee State Friday night. The sweep improved their record to 16-7 and extended their first place lead in the OVC, improving to 10-1 in conference play. Bax led the way with 12 kills, Wilson chipped in with 10 kills and seven digs of her own. Five different Lions registered at least five kills on the night, with McAleer chipping in nine kills and seven digs of her own. Atkins, seeing significantly more playing time in the second straight with Janke still out, had five kills to her name. Lindenwood hit .312 as a team and held Tennessee State to a .147 hit percentage. The Tigers also committed 16 attack errors and seven service errors while the Lions had only 12 attack errors and registered eight aces from the service line. Wilson and Otten each had 3 aces apiece. Otten, in her first match since registering 3,000 career assists, tallied another 37 assists and had nine digs defensively.
Lindenwood started off hot in set one controlling it from the jump and easily cruising to a 25-16 first set victory. Wilson, Atkins, and Bax all led the way each having four kills in the set. Otten chipped in with two aces as the Lions hit a match-high .333 in the opening set and held the Tigers to a .147 hit percentage. Otten also assisted on 15 of the Lions 16 kills in the set.
In what was a back-and-forth second set, Tennessee State held the lead for most of the second set. Lindenwood was able to tie it at 16-16, before the Tigers took another lead forcing the Lions to tie it again at 21-21 before being powered to a 25-21 thrilling set win on the backs of Bax and McAleer kills and a Wilson ace. Bax led the way with six kills in the set, and Wilson and McAleer each tallied four kills of their own. Lindenwood only hit .289 in the second set but held the Tigers to a .214 hit percentage and were able to utilize two critical aces within the set to power them to a huge 2-0 match lead.
Lindenwood capped off a 6-0 weekend vs Tennessee State with a comfortable 25-15 set 3 and match victory. Lindenwood’s superb defense powered them to victory holding the Tigers to a .038 hit percentage in the third set. The Tigers also committed seven attack errors compared to the Lions three. Lindenwood hit .320 in the final set and were powered by three kills each from Geluck and McAleer. Lexi Menne and Wilson each had two aces in the match clinching set.
Lindenwood heads on the road to face Morehead State on Oct. 31 and Nov. 1 before returning to Hyland Arena for a three-match homestand starting with, on Nov. 5 to host the Western Illinois Leathernecks, before hosting SEMO on Nov. 14-15 in a battle of the first and second place teams in the OVC.
