Box Score

The University of Evansville volleyball team (8-5, 1-1) earned its first conference win with a 3-0 win over Bradley (8-8, 0-3) Friday night in Peoria (27-25, 25-14, 25-21).

“I’m glad that we got our first conference win, especially since it was on the road,” said Evansville head coach Mike Swan. “I think that is huge because I have a feeling that it will be a battle throughout the season. I thought that we played smart and our blocking looked impressive, so hopefully this is the start of something good. I hope we carry this momentum with us to UNI tomorrow.”

Outside hitter Brooke Maher collected 12 kills and hit .407 for the match. Kaisi Nixon was close behind with nine kills followed by Ginta Gabruseva and Emily Wandersee with eight. Libero Julie Sylvester posted 20 kills in the victory.

UE trumped Bradley in every category. As a team, the Aces hit .256 compared to the Braves’ .160. UE also outblocked Bradley 12-6 with Wandersee and Viera Rajcan tabbing three each.

The first set proved to be tight early in the contest. The Aces then rolled out to their largest lead of the set at 19-11 before Bradley came back. The Braves were within three at UE’s match point before tying the game at 24. Evansville never gave up, though, and took the first set 27-25.

In the next set, UE started out with the lead and never let it go. Gaining a lead as high as nine, the Aces came out swinging to take a commanding 25-14 set heading into the third contest.

Although they have been struggling in the third set, the beginning of the next outing had the Aces quickly jump to a 14-5 advantage over the Braves. A Bradley timeout closed the gap, but a kill from Nixon sealed the 25-21 set.

The Aces will challenge Northern Iowa on Saturday at 7:00 p.m.