LOUISVILLE, Ky.—The Bellarmine volleyball team fell 3-0 to 22 nd-ranked Missouri-St. Louis in the opening round of the Great Lakes Valley Conference Championship on Friday afternoon at the Eastside Centre in East Peoria, Illinois.
The sixth-seeded Knights pushed the tourney's No. 3 seed in every set but found themselves on the short end of the scoreboard in all three games.
The Tritons seized the momentum in the opening set with a late 7-0 spurt and overcame what had been a six-point deficit. Missouri-St. Louis carried that momentum thought the end of the set, finishing with a 12-2 run for the 25-21 victory.
Set two was close from start to finish with neither team leading by more than two points. Again, UMSL found a way to close strong, turning a 22-22 tie into a 25-23 win by taking three of the last four points.
The final set saw the Tritons establish a seven-point lead at 18-11, but Knights gave fans one last gasp of hope by whittling the lead to just one at 21-20. From there, however, UMSL managed to trade points with the Knights to escape with a 25-23 win and complete the sweep.
A bright spot for Bellarmine was the play of freshman
Ashley Price, who tallied a team-high 10 kills while hitting .333. Overall, the Knights swung at a .144 clip while UMSL was exactly 100 points higher at .244.
Charlotte Richards and Kylie Rudinski paced the Tritons with 14 kills. Rudsinski was particularly effective for UMSL, posting a .524 attack percentage on the day.
The loss likely ends the season for the Knights at 20-11, their third straight 20-win season. Heading into the GLVC tourney, Bellarmine was ranked No. 10 in the region with the top eight generally getting invitations to compete in the NCAA tournament.
The Tritons improve to 28-3 on the year and advance to the GLVC semifinals where they will meet the winner of the match between Lewis and Illinois Springfield.
The good news for Bellarmine is that the team won't lose any players to graduation, and Coach
Jenni Grzebin will have a strong nucleus as the Knights transition to NCAA Division I and competition in the ASUN Conference in 2020.
For more coverage of Bellarmine athletics, follow us on Twitter (@BUKnights), Instagram (BUKnights) and Facebook (BUKnights).
BOX SCORE (HTM)
