IOWA CITY, Iowa – A tough Ball State team cruised past the Drake volleyball team, 3-0, on the second day of action at the Hawkeye Classic Saturday morning.

Ball State (7-3) took the morning match 25-15, 25-15 and 25-19 while racking up 43 kills and hitting .265. Drake (1-9) was led by Amanda Platte's (Mount Vernon, Iowa) seven kills while freshman Capris Quaites (Omaha, Neb.) added six.

The first set started off tightly contested as Drake capitalized on BSU errors to tie the match at 9-9. However, a 5-0 spurt from the Cardinals gave them the advantage needed to quickly pull away for the 25-15 win.

The second set played out much the same with the teams tied early until a 9-0 BSU run behind the serving on Jacqui Seidel and five straight errors from Drake gave the Cardinals a significant cushion at 17-7 en route to another 25-15 win.

Drake took an early lead in the third set on a Platte kill, but Ball State rallied to tie the match early. With the score at 9-8, the Cardinals rattled off another big run, outscoring Drake 11-3 during a span that saw BSU's Mackenzie Kitchell rattle off five of her match-high 12 kills.

But, with the score at 20-11, Drake didn't go down without a fight, outscoring Ball State 8-5 over the final 13 points with two kills from Platte. Unfortunately the brief rally wasn't enough to overcome the sizeable deficit as Ball State rolled to the 25-19 win.

Sarah Madden (Van Meter, Iowa) led Drake's defensive efforts with 16 digs while Rebecca Brown (Bentonville, Ark.) had seven in addition to her team-high 19 assists.

Drake will close out the Hawkeye Classic Saturday evening with a 5 p.m. match against Western Illinois in Carver-Hawkeye Arena.