The ETSU volleyball team traveled to Greenville, South Carolina, Sept. 23 to open conference play against Furman and traveled to Birmingham, Alabama, to take on Samford on Sept. 24.

The match went back and forth as each team took turns closing sets until the very last two when the Paladins locked in.

The fourth set was neck to neck as each team fought to close the set.

Despite ETSU senior Briana Allmon (Flower Mound, Texas) dominating and keeping the team close with six kills in the fourth set, the team could not close the set.

In the final set, Furman put the game away.

After being tied at nine points, Furman scored six of the next eight points to put the Bucs behind and claim a 3-2 victory.

The sets were 25-27, 25-18, 17-25, 30-28, and 15-11.

“A good battle tonight,” said ETSU Head Coach Lindsey Devine. “We did have moments to close out the match, but when we slightly opened the door, Furman took advantage. After the match we all recognized where we need to make personal adjustments, myself included, so that we will be ready for our match versus Samford tomorrow.”

Saturday the Bucs came ready and seemed to make those adjustments. Defense was in full effect, and the team defeated Samford 3-2 and kept Samford’s scoring to a limit.

In the first two sets the Bucs let everyone know that they were there to compete.

The team hit .286 and .250 in the first and second sets and the Bulldogs didn’t have much of a response as they were defeated 25-19 and 25-18.

Samford also mad adjustments and turned the tables in the next two sets. The team improved their hitting percentage from .000 in the first to .325 in the fourth.

The bulldogs won the next two sets 25-23 and 25-21

The Bucs closed the last set 15-9 to give the team another great close-out by Allmon (Flower Mound, Texas) with four kills.

“Tonight we worked through the process and overall we trusted our game plan,” Devine said. “In the fifth set tonight, I saw a team fueled to work through the challenges identified from last night which resulted in getting the win tonight.”

The next match will be on the road this Friday against the Chattanooga Mocs at 6 p.m.

Author

  • Garrett Tumlin

    Garrett Tumlin is a senior majoring in journalism with a minor in sports management. He is vice president of ETSU’s Black Affairs Association and a leader for Quest. He is also a member of Fellowship of Christian Athletes. A Chattanooga native, Tumlin has always loved writing and sports and is excited to be an athletics writer for the East Tennessean. He also works for BucTV. More recently, Tumlin has started working at the Herald & Tribune in Jonesborough. He loves basketball and his favorite NBA team is the Celtics.

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