Bryan Volleyball Survives a Tough Match at Wesleyan
Barlow Honored as Player of the Week
Senior Captain Kim Barlow was honored as Appalachian Conference, NAIA Region XII, and NCCAA National Player of the Week for her efforts last week. Barlow's 34 kills against Shorter is the highest kill total in the NAIA for a single match this season (tied for 4th among all NCAA, NAIA, and NCCAA colleges nationally). She followed the school-record performance with 23 kills against Reinhardt and 19 against Bluefield. She had 88 total kills and was in on 29 blocks in four matches last week.
Tuesday night, the volleyball team survived a hard-fought match against a tough team from Tennessee Wesleyan, 3-1 (28-30, 30-28, 32-30, 30-28).
Neither team seemed able to take control of the match, yet Bryan was able to scratch out 2-point wins in each of the last three games of the match. Bryan found themselves with a 2-point lead in game 1, but a kill and serve by Andreia Bonanno took the win away. In game 2, the Lions chipped away at an early 3-point TWC lead, and put it away 30-28. The Lions let early big leads in games three and four slip away, but stayed composed to win both after ties at 30 and 28.
Abby Humphrey led Bryan with 13 kills and 8 digs. Christine Pratt kept the Lions in the match with 23 digs, while Kathryn Rawley tallied 29 assists and 14 digs. Kim Barlow was limited to 9 kills, but her clutch blocking (5 blocks) kept the Lions in the match. Freshman Robin Renfroe's presence was felt up front, as she contributed 7 blocks and 5 kills in the Bryan win.
“If you look at the statistics for us, we should not have won,” commented Coach Sayles. “Our passing was sub-par in much of the match, which in turn kept us from being effective offensively. Wesleyan had their own struggles as well, which allowed us to stay in the match. Give TWC credit, though, they have big hitters and tough serves, which threw us off a little.
"Our work once the ball is in play keeps us in games. We are scrappy and protect the net very well. I definitely give our team credit for toughing out an ugly match and getting the win. We kept our composure even though we were not sharp tonight.
"Now some of the little things that you see in winning programs are starting to go our way. We win in close matches, we survive tough hitters, we get lucky on some balls, we stay alive with scrappy play, we can win with a solid game, but can also pull out a win in a tough match that is not so pretty. Hopefully, we will keep this trend going as we enter the second half of our season.”
Bryan is ranked 9th in the NCCAA in blocks per game. Barlow is ranked #5 in the nation in blocking, and 8th in kills per game. Libero Christine Pratt is ranked #19 in digs per game, and Setter Kathryn Rawley is #19.
Bryan , now 4-6 in conference (8-12 overall) will host a much-improved Tennessee Temple team for Homecoming on Friday at 7 p.m.