ST. LOUIS- The Missouri Baptist men's volleyball team traveled to Lebanon, Ill. tonight to take on the Bearcats of McKendree University. The Spartans entered the contest at 3-0 for the season, while the Bearcats entered at 1-4. McKendree, a team comprised of strictly freshmen, simply could not handle the experience of the Spartans, leading MBU to a 3-0 victory.
The Bearcats managed to stay neck and neck with the Spartans in the first set until a forceful kill immediately followed by a service ace by junior, Shane Welch. Welch's kill made the score 18-14, and the Spartans never looked back. The set ended with another service ace, this time from junior, Kevin Knight. The MBU offense was too much for the Bearcats to handle.
The second set was another close set. The Spartans set themselves up for a victory with a 24-18 advantage, but then allowed the Bearcats to score five consecutive points, making it a 24-23 game. Thanks to a ball handling error from McKendree's Dustin Borenstein, the Spartans picked up the second set victory.
The young Bearcats did not go down without a fight. The third set started out as a battle, however, once the score reached 20-20, the experience of Spartans showed they had been trained to close out matches. A pair of aces from Kevin Knight and a pair of kills from Josh Comer allowed the Spartans to claim set three and the match.
Comer led the Spartan offense tonight with 10 kills on 24 attempts. Knight added nine kills for MBU on 15 attempts. The Spartans saw a huge improvement with their service game, with 11 service errors versus the previous match's 35.
Tonight's victory improves MBU to 4-0 on the season, while McKendree falls to 1-5. The Spartans will travel this weekend to the Chicago area to take on Lewis University, Saint Xavier University, Lakeland College, and Dominican University.
