Boxscore
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. ? Freshman Leah Meffert and sophomore Amanda Lindgren combined for 40 kills and 48 digs to lead Tennessee Tech (4-4) to a marathon 3-2 victory over Chattanooga (1-4) on the opening night of the Country Inns & Suites Challenge at Maclellan Gym in Chattanooga, Tenn. The win is TTU's third consecutive over the Lady Mocs.
From the very beginning the two teams battled, with a total of eight lead changes and seven ties in the first game. With the score tied at 29-29, the Golden Eagles notched a Game 1 victory with back-to-back kills from Meffert to win the game 31-29 and go up 1-0 in the match. The Lady Mocs came right back in Game 2, jumping out to leads of 9-3 and 14-6 before rolling to a 30-20 victory to knot the match at 1-1.
Chattanooga again jumped out to a sizable lead in the third game, compiling a 17-10 advantage. At that point, though, the Golden Eagles came alive, recording 12 straight points to pull ahead 22-17 and outscored UTC with an overall run of 20-4 to secure a 30-21 win and pull ahead 2-1 in the match.
After quick leads of 5-1 and 7-2 for the Lady Mocs at the start of the fourth game, Tennessee Tech rallied to pull even at 12-12 and stayed close the rest of the game. Chattanooga built leads of 24-21 and 27-23 before TTU drew to within two points at 27-25. That would be as close as they would get as UTC quickly notched the next three points, with the final two coming on back-to-back kills by senior Leslee Ball (Sycamore, Ill.) and freshman Aurore Kullak (Beloeil, Belgium), to take the fourth game, 30-25, and pull even at 2-2 in the match.
The deciding fifth game saw the two teams stay within two points of each other for nearly the entire game. Midway through the Golden Eagles led 9-7 before the Lady Mocs tied the score three times, the last at 12-12. Back-to-back kills by Lindgren paved the way for TTU as they jumped back ahead 14-12 and closed out the game and the match with a 15-12 victory.
Tennessee Tech was led by Meffert and Lindgren with 18 kills and 30 digs and 22 kills and 18 digs respectively. Junior setter Kappy Lang registered 51 assists to go along with 19 digs while sophomore outside hitter Katie Kenline posted 44 digs.
For Chattanooga, seniors Leslee Ball and Bethany Herndon (Richmond, Texas) led the way, with Ball posting 18 kills, 19 digs and a hitting percentage of .447 and Herndon notching a match-high 57 assists to go along with 18 digs. Fellow seniors Jamie Engel (Troy, Ill.) and Kelsey Amundson (Houston, Texas) added 11 kills and 20 digs and eight kills and 22 digs, respectively. Junior libero Lara Newberry (Chattanooga, Tenn.) posted a team-high 42 digs and senior Julianna Martinez (Austin, Texas) added 17 kills while senior Sarah Bass finished with 12 on the evening.
The Lady Mocs resume play on the second day of the tournament on Saturday when they face UNC Asheville at 12:30 p.m. and Missouri State in the tournament finale at 5:30 p.m.
