Eagles Fall in Season Opener
August 31, 2015
The Faith volleyball team traveled 6 hours this past Saturday for a NCCAA DII match against the Archers of Moody Bible Institute in Chicago, Illinois. The match was the first for each team leaving both coach Lanny Nihart at Faith and Samuel Choy of Moody uncertain as to the exeution of their team. "Both coach Sam and I discussed prior to the match how well our teams were prepared for competition! It is difficult to align a team in a matter of weeks, however that difficulty put us both in the same position of uncertainty" noted coach Nihart.
Faith was able to maintain a presence against the much taller Archer club in set one. In set one Moody reaced out to early 4 to 0 and 10-5 advantages only to find the Eagles battle back and close the gap to 13-10. Moody continued to take advantage of Faith turnovers and secured set one 25-19. Set two found the Eagles struggling with defensive positions, due in large part due to Moody's ability to run slides and a strong outside attack. The Archers gained the win behind freshmen outside hitter Brittain Carnahan's terrific efforts. Carnahan continually put pressure on Faith's outside blockers to align, allowing for consistent scoring and hitting efficiency.
Faith battled back in the third set by moving to a 5-1 rotation with Emily Morton setting and Shannon Steffen moving to defensive specialist. "We did not move away form Shannon due to any inabilities on her part. In fact she was making good court decisions and delivering the ball to the hitters. With a 5-1 we were able to gain momentum and estalish consistency in our rotation attacks", noted Nihart. The Eagles captured a win 25-23 set win.
However, Moody was able to expose Faith's inability to block outside and gained a set four 25-19 win and 3-1 match win.
"It was a good first match. Moodyhas been ranked in the NCCAA DII Top Ten on numerous occasions and I don't see any reason why they won't be in 2015. Coach Davis and I were able to become aware of needed rotation adjustments during the match. We also had the opportunity to discern where defense and offensive schemes need changed. We only garnered 2 serve aces along with an offensive attack of 12.6% which won't win many matches. I think we will be a better club this coming Tuesday evening against North Central University and Union. It will be exciting to work with this group of players," stated Nihart.
Faith will open the home portion of their season on Monday, September 1 in a triangular with North Central University and Union College. Faith will face NCU at 4pm and Union at 6pm.