The Valpo volleyball team fell on the road for the first time on the road in MVC play Friday in Nashville, Tenn., as host Belmont earned a 3-0 (25-21, 25-21, 25-20) victory.
 
How It Happened

• The Bruins used a 6-2 spurt midway through the first set to gain control with an 18-12 advantage. Valpo responded with an 8-3 run of its own, including three kills from Jordyn Gove (Amarillo, Texas/Randall), to close to within 21-20, but were unable to tie things up as Belmont took the opener.
• The second set played out similarly to the first. Belmont's run to open up its lead came a little earlier, as the Bruins scored six out of seven points to take a tie score and make it a 12-7 lead. Valpo rallied to get back to within one at 17-16, and has the serve two more times with the chance to even things up, but Belmont closed out the set with five of the final seven points.
• Belmont took a lead it would not relinquish with an early four-point spurt, and with its edge at 15-13, strung together five points in a row as it went on to finish the sweep.

 
Inside the Match

• The loss was Valpo's first on the road in MVC play, as the Beacons had previously been 6-0 in Valley road matches. It also snapped the team's eight-match winning streak in true road matches, a streak which tied a program record.
• Friday's defeat marked the first time this season Valpo has fallen in straight sets. The Beacons had been a perfect 10-0 in three-set matches.
• Belmont's .368 hitting percentage was the highest this season by a Valpo opponent, while the Bruins' +11 advantage in the kills department was the Beacons' second-worst differential of the year.
• A bright spot from Friday's match was the performance on the attack from Ava Helming (Johnston, Iowa/Johnston), who hit .714 with a team-best 11 kills. The .714 hitting percentage is tied for the third-best in a three-set match by a Valpo player in the 25-point era.
• Gove added 10 kills on .364 hitting, as well as picking up a team-best eight digs.
• Addy Kois (Osceola, Ind./Penn) led the Beacons with 20 assists, pushing her to 2,584 career assists — just three shy of the top-10 in program history.
• Emma Hickey (Granger, Ind./Penn) was limited to six digs Friday, leaving her six away from the top-20 in NCAA D-I career history.

 
Next Up
Valpo (19-7, 10-3 MVC) looks for a weekend split when it takes on Murray State Saturday evening at 5 p.m.