Sophomore outside hitter Sara Staubach had Missouri State’s most prolific three-game offensive output in eight years to lead the Bears to a 3-0 (30-22, 31-29, 31-29) Missouri Valley Conference volleyball victory at Creighton Saturday evening in Omaha.
Staubach finished the match with 23 kills on .370 hitting to become the first MSU player since 1999 to record at least 20 kills in a three-game match.
The Bears improved to 19-3 overall and 8-1 at the midway point of the league season, while also handing coach Melissa Stokes her 150th career MVC win, good for third all-time among league coaches. The Bluejays, who entered the weekend undefeated in league play and alone in first place, fell to 13-7 overall and 7-2 in the Valley.
MSU took an early 5-1 lead in game one before the Bluejays went on a run to tie it at 9-9. The Bears then surged ahead with a 7-1 run to lead 16-10. Missouri State would lead by as many as 10 in the game and used nine kills from Staubach and seven from Jamie Adams for the win. The pair combined to hit .464 in the game as well.
Missouri State was hitting in the negatives well into game two, and drew even with the Jays at 12-12 with another Staubach kill after facing an early three-point deficit. The teams traded points to 16-16 until the Bears won four straight points for their biggest lead of the game, capped by a block from Adams and Shayla Patrick.
Adams and Patrick paired up on two more stuffs to make the score 23-17, and another two Staubach kills made the score 28-21 in favor of Missouri State. CU went on a 3-0 run to force an MSU timeout, then scored again out of the huddle to pull within three before the Bears got to match point at 29-25. The Bluejays rallied to tie the game at 29, but the Bears finished it off with a kill from Adams and a block by Patrick and Katelyn Panzau to win 31-29. Staubach added another nine kills in the game on just 16 attempts.
Creighton led for the first half of game three before three straight kills from Adams evened the score at 15-15. The Bluejays scored the next two points and maintained their lead between one and three points until Patrick smashed a kill to knot the score at 23-23. The score was tied three more times before the Bears won two straight points to take a 28-26 lead. MSU then grabbed a match point opportunity at 29-27 but the Jays responded with two points to tie it once again. Cara Hackmann and Sara Thomas blocked a CU attack for another match point and Adams gave MSU the win with her 17th kill.
The Bears hit .255 for the match and blocked 10 CU attacks, led by six from Patrick. Terri Del Conte had 18 digs, and Panzau handed out 50 assists in her first match back after missing the last two due to injury.
Missouri State returns to action Oct. 19 by hosting Illinois State at 7 p.m.
