St. Mary's City, MD - Messiah College earned a 3-0 sweep (25-19, 25-14, 25-14) over Wesley College on Saturday to open their tri-match at St. Mary's College.
In their second match-up the Falcons downed host St. Mary's 3-1 (26-24, 25-23, 24-26, 25-13).
The wins pushed Messiah to a 25-2 overall this season, and they next play on Tuesday, Oct. 27 when they travel to Albright College.
Messiah 3, Wesley 0 The Falcons got off to a great start as
Jane Underman (nine kills) and
Brooke Gallagher (15 assists) led the team to an opening game win against Wesley. That 25-19 win was the closest Wesley would get as Messiah won by identical 25-14 scores in the final two games.
Underman finished with 15 kills and
Kristen Douglas led the way with 16 kills of her own. It was the 14th time this season that Underman collected at least 15 kills in a win, and just the sixth time in a 3-0 win. Douglas reached the 15-kill mark for the 11th time this season, and it was the third time in a 3-0 win.
Gallagher finished 39 assists, and
Suzanne Harris (four) and
Taylor Hook (three) combined for seven service aces. Messiah also had just a single reception error while Wesley had nine.
Messiah 3, St. Mary's 1 Messiah's 3-1 win over St. Mary's came with more drama than their opening win over Wesley. The Falcons went down 6-2 in the opening game but rallied back to an 11-9 lead on a service ace by
Taylor Hook. Despite the swing in momentum, the Eagles battled back to take a 15-12 lead of their own, but Messiah responded to knot the game up at 17-17. From that point forward neither team led by more than two points and, after going down 24-23, Messiah got three consecutive kills from Kirsten Douglas,
Hannah Baumer, and
Taylor Hook to earn the 26-24 win.
The second game was just as close, with the teams again knotted at 23-23 near the end. This time, it was Douglas with two-straight kills off feeds from
Brooke Gallagher to seal the victory.
In the third set St. Mary's earned a close win of their own as they overcame a 19-16 Messiah lead to win 26-24.
Messiah responded in loud fashion in the fourth game, winning 25-13.
Jane Underman had six kills alone in the win, with Douglas adding three more.
Douglas (18 kills) and Underman (17) combined for 35 kills, the most in a four-set for the Falcons this season. Gallagher finished with 53 assists, the fifth time she's done so this season and the second time she's done so in a four-set match (McDaniel, 52).
