EVANSVILLE, Ind. – Lewis University's 20th ranked women's volleyball team extended its win streak to nine with a 3-1 (26-24, 25-23, 20-25, 25-18) win in the regular season finale on Saturday afternoon at Screaming Eagle Arena in Evansville, Ind. The Flyers improve to 23-6, 17-1 GLVC while the Screaming Eagles drop to 17-12, 11-7 GLVC.
Lewis will be the number one seed in next weekend's GLVC Tournament and will take on eighth seeded Indianapolis in the opening round. The Flyers won both matches this year against the Hounds in four sets. The other first round matchups will be number four seed Missouri S&T taking on number five seed Quincy while on the other side of the bracket it'll be second seeded Missouri-St. Louis playing seventh seeded Illinois Springfield and third seeded Rockhurst will take on Southern Indiana in the final match of the evening.
Lewis led for a majority of the opening set and held a four-point lead late at 21-17 but the Screaming Eagles rallied thanks to a 7-2 run to take a 24-23 lead on a kill from Taya Daizey. After a timeout, the Flyers got back-to-back kills from
Megan Schlechte (Strasburg, Ill./Stewardson-Strasburg) to reach set point and then
Ava Venema (Westmont, Ill./Timothy Christian) ended the set with a kill to give Lewis the 26-24 victory.
The second stanza went back-and-forth with 13 ties and three lead changes. The frame was knotted at 22 when
Bella Ray (Plainfield, Ill./Joliet Catholic) and
Natalie Stefanski (Plainfield, Ill./Joliet West) teamed up to block Leah Anderson and give the Flyers the lead. Ray then scored the final two points sandwiching two kills around one from Anderson to give Lewis the 25-23 victory.
The Screaming Eagles weren't going to go away without a fight as they opened the third set on a 9-3 run and never let Lewis get closer than two points the remainder of the set on their way to a 25-20 victory. Anderson and Abby Bednar led USI with four kills apiece in the frame.
The Flyers never trailed in the final stanza as they raced out to a 4-0 lead and extend its lead to 10-4 on a kill from Stefanski. The Eagles cut the deficit to 16-15 on back-to-back kills from Bednar but that was the closest they got as Lewis finished the match on a 9-3 run to win 25-18.
The Flyers hit .212 in the contest recording 62 kills against 22 errors in 189 chances and were led by Venema with a match-high 17 kills while Schlechte added 15 kills and Ray finished with 13.
Lauren Stenman (Maplewood, Minn./North St. Paul) dished out 51 assists while Venema and Ray combined for seven total blocks.
Jamie Poppen (Ballwin, Mo./Parkway West) finished with a match-high 28 digs and became just the second player in school history to surpass the 2,000 dig mark in her career with 2,006.
USI hit .201 in the match with 50 kills against 15 errors in 174 swings and was led by Taylor Litteken with 12 kills while Anderson added 11 more. Casey Cepicky had 27 assists and Callie Gubera finished with 20 digs.
The Flyers and Greyhounds will meet in the quarterfinal round of the GLVC Tournament on Friday (Nov. 19) at 11:30 a.m. at the Eastside Centre in East Peoria, Ill.
