GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. -- After commanding its opponent early with a first-match 3-0 victory over Wilberforce University (Ohio), the University of St. Francis Fighting Saints women's volleyball team closed out the day with a 3-0 defeat to No. 17-ranked Aquinas College (Mich.) on Wednesday night.
USF def. Wilberforce (25-14, 25-15, 25-9)
St. Francis controlled things early and often in its first match of the night, never relinquishing the lead throughout Set 1 in the 25-14 win. The second set began in Wilberforce's (0-6) favor as it was able to hold a 3-2 advantage through the first five rallies. The Saints then settled in, however, to take the lead at 11-8 before a 14-7 surge allowed USF to walk away with the 25-15 victory.
Riding off the momentum attained with the dominate second half of the Set 2 win, the third set belonged to the Saints from the beginning. Six kills from five different players and one service ace apiece from
Delani Kirstein and
Alyssa Teske enabled USF to jump out to a 12-3 lead. Five additional USF kills and three service aces would account for all but five of St. Francis' final 13 points to produce the commanding 25-9 win. St. Francis' .444 attack percentage in the final set left no doubt as the Saints rang up 10 kills against only two errors in 18 chances.
Teske (10 kills) and Kirstein (six) led the way offensively for the Saints, while Kirstein was one dig short of a double-double with nine.
Landry Hall captained the offense as she registered 13 assists. The Saints outhit the Bulldogs .324 to -.029 on the night.
Aquinas def. USF (25-21, 25-21, 25-13)
Courtesy of its team .330 attack percentage and six of 10 players hitting at least .350, Aquinas (2-0) was able to walk away with a three set sweep over the Saints. USF (1-1) did not make things easy for the hosts throughout the first two sets, however, after producing two four-point differentials by the midway point in each of those games. After trading points over the next 16 rallies in Set 1to mark the score at 23-21, Aquinas would seal the deal with back-to-back kills to finalize the score at 25-21. In set 2, the Saints would fight their way back from a four-point deficit (20-16) to knot the score at 20-all before allowing the hosts to rattle off five of the sets' remaining six points.
In Set 3, Aquinas opened up a 15-5 lead and never looked back in clinching the 3-0 sweep.
Aubrey Phillips finished with six kills in the match to end the day with a total of 12.
Ann Simon produced eight digs to total 10 over the two matches.
Up Next
St. Francis has 13 days of rest before it returns to action on Tuesday, Sept. 1. The Saints will be back on the road to take on Indiana University South Bend in their Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference opener. The match is slated to begin at 7 pm CST.
You can keep up with everything happening around USF Athletics on X @USFSaints.
