LANGSTON, Okla. – Despite being a little short-handed due to injuries going into the match, the MACU Volleyball team took care of business in its road match at Langston as the Evangels dominated every facet of the game to run away with a three-set sweep inside C.F. Gayles Field House on Thursday night.
 
SCORE

• Mid-America Christian 3, Langston 0 (25-20, 25-19, 25-10)
  • Mid-America Christian (13-8, 9-4 SAC)
  • Langston (3-20, 2-13 SAC)

TOP PERFORMERS

• Miriam Nardi – 13 Kills, .571 ATK%
• Alica Obusekova – 9 Kills, .286 ATK%, 3 Digs
• Sarah Jones-Stafford – 6 Kills, .857 ATK%, 5 Blocks
• Casady McKinney – 16 Assists, 6 Digs, 5 Aces

MATCH SUMMARY

• Set One
  • After trading the first four rallies, Mid-America Christian was able to get some early breathing room as MACU scored six of the next eight points as an Annabeth Fehrle kill doubled up the MACU lead at 8-4, forcing a Lady Lions timeout.
  • While MACU was able maintain its advantage until the 24^th rally, Langston put together a strong run, tallying five of the next six points with a (service ace) tied it up at 15-all.
  • A much-need Miriam Nardi side-out slam in the middle of the Langston defense stemmed the tide back toward the Evangels as MACU scored 10 of the final 15 with Nardi finishing off the set on a right-side kill that was too much for the Lions defense to handle.
• Set Two
  • MACU started out the second stanza quickly. After conceding the first point, MACU went on an 8-1 run as back-to-back kills by Alica Obusekova and Nardi made it an 8-2 Evangels advantage.
  • Langston managed to cut its deficit down to five on a couple of occasions during the first half of the set, the last coming on a Natalia Rodriguez service error to make it 12-7, but Mid-America Christian scored six-straight as the Evangels built their lead out to 18-8 following a Lions attack error.
  • LU tried to battle back late, eventually closing it to a five-point game at 24-19, but an Alycia Shaw service error ended it on the third set point.
• Set Three
  • Mid-America Christian opened the third set on absolute fire as McKinney tallied three service aces and Nardi notched a kill to give MACU a commanding 7-0 advantage right out of the gate.
  • The Evangels continued to grow their overwhelming advantage as a pair of Madison Lee aces and a Lions miscue set up a Fehrle finish to extend the MACU edge to 15-2.
  • After a Sarah Jones-Stafford and Kaylee Harrison assisted block gave MACU its largest lead of the match at 20-4, Langston strung together a 6-1 run to cut the deficit down to 21-10. However, MACU would abruptly halt the Lady Lions charge as three consecutive kills following an LU service error by Obusekova, Jones-Stafford and Nardi wrapped up the 25-10 final.

MATCH NOTES

• Mid-America Christian thoroughly dominated all facets of the game as MACU registered 39 kills on a .294 attack percentage while the defense limited Langston to only 18 kills while forcing 17 hitting miscues for a .014 hitting clip.
• The trio of Miriam Nardi, Alica Obusekova and Sarah Jones-Stafford were downright excellent in the attack as Nardi posted a match-high 13 kills on a .571 attack percentage, Obusekova notched nine kills on a .286 rate and on limited chances, Jones-Stafford put down six kills on just seven attack for a blistering .857 hitting percentage.
• Despite not playing at 100-percent, junior setter Casady McKinney put together one of her best three-set matches of the season as she dished out a match-high 16 assists and shoveled six digs while tallying five aces from the service line.
• As a team, MACU finished with 11 aces, which went down as the second-most for the Evangels in a match this season. On-top of McKinney's five-ace night, Sydney Martin finished with three aces while Madison Lee pitched in a pair.
• MACU's back-row defense had a quiet night against the Lions team that struggled to put attacks over the net as the Evangels as a team needed to make only 29 digs as a squad while Ryley Bowden finished with a team-best eight for the match.
• On-top of her great night in the attack, Jones-Stafford was simply sensational defensively at the net, finishing with a solo block and four assisted blocks for five total blocks for the match. Her blocking efforts allowed Jones-Stafford to climb up MACU's NAIA Era (2007-present) career blocks record book as her 208^th allowed the graduate student middle to surpass Kacee Montgomery (2012-13) for fourth on the list. Jones-Stafford now sits just four back of drawing even with Mary Burkhead (2014-17) for third in the books.
• By getting the victory, MACU completed the series sweep over Langston after getting a three-set sweep over the Lady Lions inside the Gaulke Activity Center back on Sept. 14. The Evangels extended their win streak to 15 over the Lady Lions since 2016 while coming up with their 14^th complete-game sweep in that time frame.

UP NEXT

• Mid-America Christian will head north to Kansas on Saturday as the Evangels travel to McPherson to seek a series sweep against Central Christian. Opening serve is slated for 1 p.m. inside Jerry E. Alexander Arena.