Lady Eagles Split in Final Regular Season Road-Trip

The Lady Eagles traveled to Missouri to play their last two regular season matches before the start of postseason play. After defeating Ozark Christian College (Joplin, MO) on Friday night, Faith battled against Cottey College (Nevada, MO) on Saturday but had difficulty finishing out the later sets and suffered a 3-0 loss. 

The game against Ozark Christian College had a unique start for the Eagles, as two of their players were injured during warmups, which rendered them unable to participate. The Eagles played well throughout each set and earned the 3-0 win. The meeting with Ozark was the third time the two teams had met this season, with Faith coming away with the victory each time.  

On Saturday, the Eagles faced a tougher opponent in Cottey College. Faith knew that the height of Cottey's front row would present a challenge they'd have to work around. The Eagles struggled in the opening set, hitting just 9.7% as opposed to Cottey's 32.4%., and dropped set one 16-25. After trailing early in set two, Faith made the adjustments they needed to and fought back to take a 17-14 lead. Cottey tied up the score at 17-17, and the teams would go back-and-forth exchanging control. Faith found themselves down 24-25, but after a timeout and attack error by Cottey, the Eagles evened the score at 25-25. Cottey, however, would go on to get a kill and service ace to take set two 27-25. The third set looked a lot like the first. Faith was down early but came back to go ahead 19-15. Cottey did just as they had before and tied it up at 21-21. They continued their run to pull ahead 22-24. Faith got the serve back with the score at 23-24, but a missed serve ended the set and gave Cottey the 3-0 game victory.

The Eagles seven service errors on Saturday hurt them in the long-run. Abby Booth led the offensive attacks with 9 kills, and Bekah Smith was close behind with 8. Emilie Morton tallied 28 assists. Libero Cara Hodak ended with 17 digs, and Alicia Smith also added 16 digs of her own. 

Faith begins postseason play this weekend in the MCCC conference tournament hosted at Emmaus Bible College (Dubuque, IA).