Boxscore

STATESBORO, Ga. ? Senior middle blocker Leslee Ball (Sycamore, Ill.) drilled a match-high 23 kills and senior setter Bethany Herndon (Richmond, Texas) recorded a match-high 38 assists to lead Chattanooga (9-6, 4-0) to a 3-1 victory over Georgia Southern (4-13, 1-4) Saturday afternoon at Hanner Fieldhouse in Statesboro, Ga. The Lady Mocs defeated the Eagles 30-19, 19-30, 30-25 and 30-18 to win their seventh consecutive match and remain tied with The College of Charleston atop the Southern Conference.

Chattanooga jumped out to an early 7-2 lead in Game 1, aided by back-to-back kills from Ball, before the Eagles rebounded with a 10-6 run to close the gap to 13-12. An 11-3 run, fueled by three consecutive kills from Ball, put the Lady Mocs up 24-15. After a brief rally by Georgia Southern made the score 26-19, Chattanooga wrapped up the game with four straight points for a 30-19 victory and 1-0 match lead. Ball nailed nine of her match-high 23 kills in the game.

In Game 2, it was a different story as the Eagles charged out of the gate to take an early 10-5 lead. At that point, the Lady Mocs offense went cold as Georgia Southern proceeded to go on a decisive 14-4 run to extend the lead to 24-9. A 10-3 run got Chattanooga back into the match, 27-19 but it would not be enough as GSU took the next three points to tie the match with a 30-19 victory. Prior to that loss, the Lady Mocs had won 17 straight games dating back to a Game 4 win against UC Riverside on September 15.

The two teams battled through five lead changes and four ties early in Game 3 to knot the score at 6-6. At that point, the Lady Mocs put together a 10-3 run behind a pair of kills each from junior right side hitter Laura Nethery (Hixson, Tenn.) and senior middle blocker Sarah Bass (Baton Rouge, La.) to pull ahead 16-9.

Georgia Southern came right back with a 9-1 run of their own to close to 17-16. UTC pulled out to a 20-17 advantage before the Eagles eventually tied the score, 21-21. From there, Chattanooga took control of the game, registering the next four points to claim a 25-21 lead, and went on to a 30-25 victory to up 2-1 in the match.

After taking a narrow 5-4 lead at the start of Game 4, the Lady Mocs wasted no time in taking care of business, pounding out another 10-3 run for a 15-7 advantage. After a 5-1 mini run by the Eagles closed the gap to 16-12, Chattanooga sealed the deal with an 8-1 run to extend their lead to 24-13. UTC then proceeded to close out the game, and the match, with a 30-18 victory.

Junior setter Mae Chabra led the way for the Eagles with a team-high 31 assists while junior outside hitter Bianca Julio paced the hitters with a team-high 11 kills along with seven digs. Junior outside hitter Christy Dowd added six kills to go along with her team-high 11 digs and freshman middle hitter Sara Gildersleeve contributed eight kills. Freshman libero Marissa Odom finished with nine digs.

For Chattanooga, Leslee Ball led all hitters with 23 kills and added nine digs and junior libero Lara Newberry (Chattanooga, Tenn.) led the way defensively with a match-high 24 digs. Bass finished with 10 kills while senior outside hitter Jamie Engel (Troy, Ill.) notched a career-high six service

aces to along with eight digs and five kills. Freshman outside hitter Aurore Kullak (Beloeil, Belgium) added 10 digs and senior outside hitter Kelsey Amundson (Houston, Texas) finished with seven digs. In addition to her match-high 38 assists, Herndon also added five kills and eight digs.

The Lady Mocs have now won seven consecutive matches. That is Chattanooga's longest winning streak since 1999 when that year's squad won a program record-tying 10 straight matches. Three other teams have won 10 consecutive matches for the Lady Mocs including the 1986, 1997 and 1998 teams.

The Lady Mocs will be back in action on Wednesday, October 3 when they host East Tennessee State in a non-conference match. First serve is set for 7 p.m.

Notes

With her 23 kills, Leslee Ball is now in fifth place on the Chattanooga all-time kills list with 1,154 ... Ball is 26 kills away from tying Carol Reedus (1997-00) for fourth place all-time at 1,180 kills ... the Game 2 loss snaps the Lady Mocs 17-game winning streak.