Weekend road trip starts with Pride 3-0 loss at Baker

BALDWIN CITY, Kan. - Starting a stretch of four-straight matches away from home with the first of two back-to-back days, the Clarke University women's volleyball team dropped a 3-0 match to Baker University on Friday night.

The first and third sets saw the Wildcats earn fairly comfortable 25-18 set wins but the second set was full of drama, going extra points where BU would pull out a 28-26 set win after coming back from down 23-19 to tie the score at 23-23 but CU would have a set point, not only at 24-23 but also at 26-25 before Baker scored the final three points of the set behind kills from Bylie Murray and Brie Reedy before a Clarke attack error finished the set.

Murray led all players in the match with 14 kills and only had four errors for a .370 with the leader in kills for the Pride coming from the middle as sophomore Kaelyn Minich had eight kills on 15 swings for a .333 hitting percentage while adding three block assists in the three sets.

Clarke was heavy on the block on Friday with seven block assists and two more solo blocks with Kelsey NeCollins finishing with one of the solo blocks and being in on four of the block assists where the other solo block coming from Keely Colyer, who also had three block assists, five kills, and 10 assists in the match.

Amelia Driver had a seven-kill performance with Kortney Harms finishing with a team-high 15 assists and Jayden Knox recording 12 digs to lead the team, slightly ahead of Kira Finlay's eight digs in just two sets of action.

Pride women's volleyball will have a quick turnaround when they stay in the Kansas City area to take on Benedictine College on Saturday for an 11:00 a.m. CT start in Atchison, Kan. to close out their weekend.