CONWAY, Ark. – Playing two non-conference games to finish out the regular season, the East Texas Baptist University split their matches in the Conway Classic. After 28 games played, ETBU's final record is 14-14 as they head into the American Southwest Conference Tournament as the #2 seed from the East Divison.
Game one saw ETBU fall in three sets to Hendrix College. Sydney Lopez led the Tigers on offense with 10 kills and five digs. Cassidy Zellmer directed the offense, dishing out 13 assists in the match, while Meredith Augsburger chipped in 10. Julia De Los Santos manned the back row defense by recording 17 digs, while Paige Miller chipped in an all-around performance of 6 kills and 10 digs. Alexis Contos anchored the frontline, turning in four blocks on the day. As a team, ETBU recorded 33 kills, 32 assists and 51 digs in the loss. Lauren Dwyer led HC with 12 kills.
ETBU bounced back to sweep Rhodes College later in the day in their second match. Bailey Byas had 13 kills while Lizeth Flores had a team-high six blocks. Zellmer again led ETBU in assists with 18 while Karina Lay posted 18 digs. RC was led by seven kills from Tyler Feddema and 15 assists from Marissa Hall.
Game 1: HC 3, ETBU 0
The Warriors had the first answer to start the match, scoring the first point off of a kill by Dwyer to take the 1-0 lead. The Tigers responded with two kills by Lindsey Hill off of great setups by Zellmer to take the lead at 2-1. The match was knotted at 4-4 over the next several exchanges, until HC scored the next two points to go on top 6-4. A Lopez kill narrowed the gap to within one (6-5), but the Warriors rattled off six straight points to increase the lead to 12-5. The Tigers trailed by as many as nine before losing the opening set to HC, 25-16.
ETBU found themselves down early at the start of set two (5-2) before a kill by Lopez capped off a run of three straight points to tie the set 5-5. An attack error by HC and blocks by Byas and Contos gave the Tigers a 7-5 lead over the next sequence. ETBU led 11-8 until a 4-1 run by the Warriors squared the game at 12-12. The set was tied again, 14-14, before HC rattled off an 11-4 run to close out set two and claim the 25-18 win.
In the third set, ETBU held an early two point lead (4-2) only to see HC come right back. HC would then square the match at 5-5, just before embarking on a 5-1 run to take the lead at 10-6. The Tigers would battle throughout the set, narrowing the gap to two points on several occasions. But the team was able to get over the hump, losing the final set 25-18.
Game 2: ETBU 3, RC 0
ETBU started the first set scoring seven of the first eight points as Byas would lead with two kills while Meredith Augsburger, Flores, Lopez, and Zellmer each had a kill. The lead would grow to as high as 11 points at 13-2 with Byas tacking on two more kills during that sequence. Over the next 11 serves, the double-digit lead by ETBU remained until it was 18-8. RC would get four straight points to trail 18-12 before ETBU finished off the Lynx with a 7-4 run to win set one 25-15.
Set two was evenly-played for the first 10 serves as neither side built a lead of more than two points. Down 5-4, the Tigers would use a service ace from Amy Frias and a kill by Contos along with errors by RC to lead 8-5. RC responded with a 5-2 run to tie the score at 10 apiece. Then the Tigers would take off on a 10-3 run to lead 20-13 as Lay and Miller kept the rallies going with their serves. But RC would not back down as they stormed back with a 10-2 run to lead 23-22. Fortunately, Flores and Byas gave the Tigers the lead before RC committed an error giving the Tigers a hard-fought 25-23 win in set two.
Momentum continued in set three as ETBU raced off to a 9-1 lead with Byas contributing three kills in that stretch. ETBU escalated the margin to 14-4 with Lopez and Contos picking up key kills to help in that stretch. Although the Lynx would get as close as eight points at 15-7, from that point on, the Tigers would only manage to maintain a double-digit lead as they would finish off RC in the third set winning 25-12.
ETBU will travel to Belton, Texas, at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor next Thursday where they take on McMurry University in the first round of the ASC Tournament. The game will start at 7:30 PM.
