Box Score
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Trailing by two sets, Belmont University volleyball staged a thrilling comeback and won three straight frames to pull off a reverse sweep of visiting Eastern Illinois on Friday night at the Curb Event Center.
One point away from falling in straight sets at 22-24 in the third frame, Belmont rattled off a 4-0 run to win, 26-24, and the comeback was on. The Bruins (7-12, 5-4 OVC) would secure a dramatic home victory 18-25, 20-25, 26-24, 27-25, 15-13.
"I'm really proud of the team for the fight, I'm proud of them for how they kept chipping away and how they stayed pretty composed," head coach Katelyn Harrison said. "Ultimately, every coach wishes you come out clean and win it right away, but at the end of the day, the fight that they showed to reverse sweep them—that's a very mature team and I think that we're moving in the right direction as a program, and I'm just really proud of them."
The victory is Belmont's second five-set victory in four days, after beating Tennessee State, 3-2, on Tuesday.
Eastern Illinois (7-11, 0-8 OVC) began the match with an aggressive, efficient attack, surprising the Bruins with a 25-18 set win in the opening frame while hitting .312. The Panthers then kept their foot on the gas in the second set, winning 25-20. Danielle Allen would finish with a career-high 24 kills for the Panthers, while TaKenya Stafford added a career-best 20 kills.
In the third set, the home team began to come alive, thanks in part to the continued pressure in the middle applied by Mary Catherine Ball, who finished with 11 kills, hitting .333 in the process.
The Bruins jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the third frame, signaling that a corner may have been turned in the match. Eastern Illinois roared back to take a 14-10 lead, before things were knotted back at 19-19.
The Panthers pushed the Bruins all the way to the brink, leading 24-22 in the third set, just one point away from ending the match with a 3-0 sweep. Belmont had other ideas. Thanks to kills from Floyd and Shoopman, the home side fought to live another set with a 4-0 run that secured a 26-24 win.
Things were similarly tight in the fourth set. Floyd's nine kills in the frame kept the Bruins close, with the action eventually tied at 22-22. Eastern Illinois scraped out a 25-24 advantage, again just one point away from closing out the Bruins.
The Bruins refused to go down, feeding Lauren Walsh on back-to-back sequences to highlight another thrilling come-from-behind set win at 27-25. Walsh finished with 14 kills in the match.
"Late fight in the third to take it," Harrison said, "late fight in the fourth to take it, and the fifth, thankfully, was decided a little quicker."
Thanks to one final resounding kill from Ball, Belmont won back-to-back points to break a 13-13 tie in the fifth set and send the Bruin bench into euphoria.
The Bruins were out-blocked 15.0 to 10.0, out-hit .199 to .187, and out-served--six aces and nine errors compared to seven aces and three errors for Eastern Illinois.
The final three sets were won by a combined six points.
"A win is a win," Harrison said with a smile.
Belmont has now won ten of 11 all-time matchups with Eastern Illinois, and at 5-4 in OVC play, has their most conference wins since 2018
Belmont will face Eastern Illinois on Saturday inside the Curb Event Center at 4 p.m. There will not be a video stream of the action, but fans can follow along with live stats or with @BelmontVB on Twitter.
Follow Belmont volleyball on social media - @BelmontVB on Twitter and @belmontvball on Instagram - for complete coverage of the Bruins. Stay up to date with all of Belmont's athletic programs via the official app of the Belmont Bruins, available both in the Apple App Store and on Google Play.
