Box Score
HILO, Hawaii – The Montana State Billings volleyball team dropped a 3-0 decision (25-16, 25-15, 25-20) to Ashland University Saturday morning as it fell to 0-3 on the year, while Ashland improved to 2-1. The Yellowjackets will close out the first weekend of action Saturday evening as they look for their first win of the season versus Hawaii Hilo at 7:30 p.m. Hawaii time. Audio streaming also will be available for the game.
“It was a real letdown after last night,” head coach Steve Smith said. “Ashland was a team we should've competed better against. A lot of it is our first contact and defense right now and we were not very technically sound today. We have to bounce back tonight versus Hawaii Hilo.”
The Jackets hit just .035 in the match while Ashland hit .330 and doubled-up MSUB in kills and assists, 44 to 22 and 38 to 19, respectively. MSUB committed 19 errors to 15 for AU. Jen Boe led the way for MSUB with seven kills and seven digs, while Brooke Tolman continued her impressive start to her MSUB setting career with 17 of 19 assists.
Ashland was led by 16 kills from Kate Eckels and 10 from Brittney Snider. Crystal Elliott led the team with 34 assists and Arian Martin tallied 12 digs.
In a match that saw a lot of runs, Ashland broke a 13-13 tie with a 12-3 run to end the first set after MSUB had clawed its way back to a tie after being down by as many as five points early on. Set two also saw AU jump out to an early lead of 10-5. From there, AU scored eight of the next 10 points as Lauren Schweitzer had eight consecutive serves for an 18-8 lead and eventually a 25-15 victory.
In the third set, the Yellowjackets showed some life as the set began with a Whitney Mickelsen ace, followed by three-straight serves from Morgan Moss for a 4-2 lead. The Jackets swelled the lead to 10-6, but a timely stoppage by Ashland brought the Eagles back to a 10-10 score.
Later in the set, the Jackets led 20-17, but AU rattled off the final eight points on Baley Bernthisel serves for the 25-20 victory to close the match.
Fans can access live stats of each of the matches by logging on to http://hiloathletics.com/sports/2010/9/2/MSOC_0902101645.aspx?id=22.
