BOWLING GREEN, Ky. - The Western Kentucky University volleyball team suffered only its second Sun Belt Conference loss of the season Friday night, falling 3-0 (21-25, 22-25, 19-25) to Middle Tennessee at E. A. Diddle Arena.
The loss is the first for the Lady Toppers (25-7, 14-2) at home in conference play and first in 10 Sun Belt matches. Both of WKU's conference losses this season came against MTSU.
"Hats off to Middle Tennessee," WKU coach Travis Hudson said. "They played fantastic. I don't think you can start by taking anything away from them at all. I think they played very, very well and they came in here and deserved to win the match.
"Every game was back and forth, back and forth, back and forth to a certain point and we would have a couple breakdowns and that was enough because of how they were playing."
WKU was limited to a .163 hitting percentage and committed 23 attack errors in front of a season-best crowd of 1,074.
"I can't say enough about the atmosphere in Diddle tonight," Hudson said. "16 years ago when I started here, I don't think anybody in their wildest, wildest dreams would have ever thought that Diddle Arena would hold a volleyball crowd like that."
With its win, MTSU (25-5, 15-1) claims the No. 1 seed at next week's conference tournament. WKU is the No. 2 seed and its opponent has not yet been determined.
The Blue Raiders used a strong offensive attack, posting a .330 hitting percentage and recording 38 kills while committing only seven attack errors.
Sophomore Jordyn Skinner led the WKU offense with nine kills. Junior Tiffany Elmore and senior Emily Teegarden each finished with eight kills.
Defensively, sophomore libero Sarah Rogers paced the team with 11 digs and Skinner added 10. Ashley Potts and Kelly Potts each recorded six digs.
"Our kids played hard," Hudson said. "I leave this match with great disappointment but I am not upset with how our kids played. Our kids played hard. We needed to play better certainly if we were going to play against a team that was playing that well. I'm not upset with what our kids put out there tonight, we just got beat by a better team."
With the score tied 7-7 in the first set, MTSU tallied seven of the next nine points to take a 14-9 lead. WKU rallied to close the gap to 20-19 before the Blue Raiders used a 4-1 win to force set point and closed out the set on a kill by Maria Szivos.
The second set went back and forth with 13 ties and four lead changes. With the score 16-16, MTSU scored four straight to take a 20-16 lead and led the rest of the game.
The two teams also battled in the third set, forcing 11 ties and five lead changes. At 15-15, the Blue Raiders used an 8-2 run to build a 23-17 lead. A kill by Skinner and a bad set by MTSU made the score 23-19 before the Blue Raiders closed out the 25-19 win.
The Lady Toppers return to action next week at the Sun Belt Conference Volleyball Tournament hosted by Middle Tennessee. The tournament runs Thursday through Saturday at Alumni Memorial Gym in Murfreesboro, Tenn.
WKU-MTSU Box
