MACOMB, Ill. - The Drake University volleyball team won its ninth and 10th matches of the season with a pair of wins Friday at the Buffalo Wild Wings Invitational in Macomb, Ill. The Bulldogs opened the day with a 3-2 win against McNeese State and closed their schedule in the tournament with a convincing 3-0 victory versus the host, Western Illinois, in which the Bulldogs hit .422 as a team.
Kyla Inderski (Urbandale, Iowa) and Cathryn Cheek (Coppell, Texas) led the Bulldogs with 30 and 25 kills, respectively, and the pair both averaged a double-double with 40 digs between them. As a team, Drake hit a combined .309 in the wins with five Bulldogs hitting .300 or better as the team played near error-free volleyball. Setter Paige Aspinwall (Dayton, Minn.) had 69 assists in the two games to join Inderski on the all-tournament team.
"Sometimes everything comes together, and tonight everything came together," said Drake head coach Darrin McBroom. "We really found our rhythm and everyone, to a player, executed their role. We had so many other players that were all-tournament worthy when you look at the games Odessa Cody, Natalie Fry and Emily Plock had tonight. We didn't have many errors and played precision Drake volleyball tonight."
The Bulldogs (10-3) rallied in the morning to erase a two-set deficit to defeat McNeese State, 3-2. Drake dropped the first two sets, 21-25, 23-25, before rallying to sweep the next three at 25-18, 25-18, 15-13. Three Bulldogs notched double-figure kills in the win with Inderski and Cheek each recording 17 while Elle Tubbs got a career-high 12 kills on 24 attempts. As a team, the Bulldogs hit a stout .241.
"It was a big test for our team, McNeese played a little unorthodox and challenged us," McBroom said. "We managed to hang with them through those first two sets and showed great grit and tenacity to come from behind and get the victory against a team that had taken Alabama to five sets."
Drake scored the final five points of the third set with back-to-back kills from Cheek reversing the Bulldogs' fortunes. The fourth set was knotted midway through at 15-15. However, the Bulldogs again rallied with a 5-0 run to take the set 25-18 and force a fifth set. Drake scored the first four points of the fifth set off Tubbs' serving and later kills from Tubbs and Cheek gave the Bulldogs a 14-9 cushion. McNeese pulled within one point at 14-13, but a kill from freshman Gillian Gergen (Janesville, Iowa) polished off McNeese State to give Drake another five-set victory.
In the evening match, the Bulldogs didn't need two sets to get in gear as they stormed past Western Illinois in three sets by scores of 25-18, 25-15, 25-13
Drake led the first set by just a point, 17-16, before pulling away and scoring four-straight points to end the set. Drake jumped out to a 10-3 lead in the second set that was extended to a 20-9 advantage and hit .485 as a team in cruising to the 25-15 win in the second set. After the intermission, the Bulldog kept up the pressure in rolling out to a big lead en route to a 25-13 win to sweep the Leathernecks.
The Bulldogs return to the court next weekend to begin Missouri Valley Conference action with games at Loyola and MVC newcomer Valparaiso.
