JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (Oct. 21, 2023) – After dropping the first set, the ETSU volleyball team rallied to upend Western Carolina in four sets (15-25, 25-14, 25-21, 25-22) at Brooks Gym Saturday night.  
 
Stat Standouts – Amanda Lowe led the charge for ETSU on Saturday with a career-high 19 kills on a .325 hitting percentage. Brianna Cantrell added 13 kills and 10 digs, while Jenna Forster also had an efficient offensive performance with 11 kills with an attack percentage of .348. Malgorzata Andersohn recorded yet another double-double with 45 assists and 13 digs. Melanie Morris (career-high 18 digs) and Abbey Thomas (two solo blocks, six block assists) paced the Buccaneer defense in the victory.
 
Set 1 – The first set of Saturday's match was all Catamounts. WCU attacked at a .471 clip and racked up 19 kills in a convincing 25-15 win against ETSU. Lowe (three kills) and Lundyn Coffman (two kills) totaled five kills on nine attempts with no errors to lead the Bucs, but Western Carolina's offense proved too much to overcome.
 
Set 2 – The Buccaneers rebounded in a major way in the second frame. ETSU scored nine of the first 11 points in the set and totaled five blocks in the stanza to even the match at a set a piece with a 25-14 triumph. In addition to the work on defense, ETSU also improved its hitting percentage from .103 to .276 in the second.
 
Set 3 – It looked like ETSU may run away with the third frame as well as it held an 8-1 lead at one point. However, Western Carolina clawed all the way back to get back within a point of the Bucs, 10-9. The Buccaneer offense continued to roll though as Lowe and Forster both totaled five kills, while Cantrell and Coffman added four and three kills, respectively. Performances by those players and the rest of the Bucs were enough for ETSU to take the third, 25-21.
 
Set 4 – In what proved to be the final set of the match, the Bucs and Catamounts battled until the end. An ace from Western Carolina brought WCU within a point, 22-21. Lowe pushed the Buccaneer lead back out to two with her 19^th kill of the night, 23-21. The two teams exchanged the next two points before Cantrell capped the victory with a kill to give the Bucs the win, 25-22.
 
Next Up – ETSU, now 3-18 overall and 3-7 in SoCon play, will head out on the road for a pair of matches at Chattanooga on Friday (6 p.m.) and UNC Greensboro on Saturday (5 p.m.).
 
For more information on Buccaneer volleyball, visit ETSUBucs.com and click on the volleyball tab.