ST. LOUIS – Missouri Baptist men's volleyball jumped-out to a big lead in set one against Lindenwood-Belleville (Ill.) and was able to hold-on to a five set victory over the Lynx on Monday (25-9, 20-25, 25-12, 27-25,15-12).
Missouri Baptist (18-6, 5-0 NAIA South) took control in the first set with a commanding offensive effort. Missouri Baptist hit .435 as a team and took advantage of eight Lynx errors to take set one 25-9. The 16-point win tied for the largest margin of victory the team had this season since Feb. 10 against Missouri Valley.
Lindenwood-Belleville responded in the second set and pushed the No. 3-ranked Spartans with a big five-point victory of its own. After hitting -0.111 in the first set, the Lynx turned it around and hit 0.370 in set two with 15 kills on 27 swings.
Momentum shifted back toward the Spartans in the third set. Though MBU recorded just eight kills, they held the Lynx to -0.176 attack percentage and rolled to a third set, 25-12 win.
The home team quickly erased the set three loss from its memory and attempted to play spoiler on home court. Lindenwood-Belleville recorded 13 kills with just three errors as it came from behind late to take the victory. Chris Flood broke the 23-all tie with a kill on the outside to put Missouri Baptist at the service line for the win. It was the Lynx, however, that not only tied the game, but held on to post the final two points to take the match to the tiebreak set.
The Spartans played even to the Lynx in the fifth set, but was able to pull away in the end. MBU's Flood broke an 11-all tie with a kill to give the Missouri Baptist a 12-11 lead and built the advantage to 14-11. It was Mico Janicijevic, however, that finished the match for the Spartans with his 20th kill of the match.
Sean Benedict and Chris Flood followed Janicijevic with 11 kills apiece while Kyle Foley led the offense with 53 assists on the night. The freshman averaged 13.25 assists per set in the match..
Missouri Baptist will continue the road trip with back-to-back games and play Tuesday at Missouri Valley College. First serve is scheduled for 7:00 p.m.
