John Brown volleyball comes up short during Texas road swing

WAXAHACHIE, Texas — On the back end of a tough Texas road swing, the John Brown University volleyball team pushed conference-leading Southwestern Assemblies of God (Texas) to four sets, but the Lions won their 15th consecutive contest on Saturday afternoon inside the Sheaffer Center.

In the four-set loss (2517, 25-20, 23-25, 25-21), the Golden Eagles (5-7, 5-3 Sooner Athletic) posted nine team blocks, including five from junior Lindsey Davis and three each from juniors Megan Beck and Jessica Meyer, but the combination of SAGU’s Kali Shaw and Suzanny Figueiredo was too much to handle in pivotal moments. The Lion duo combined for 34 of SAGU’s 61 terminations (56 percent).

John Brown came back from a 21-18 hole to avoid the sweep and finished the third set on a 4-0 run to build momentum for the fourth set. However, hitting just .024 (7-6-41) in the final set was too much to overcome. Meyer posted a pair of kills and freshman Jenna Lowery added an ace and a termination in the game-clinching run in the third frame.

After trailing 10-9 in the first, SAGU built a comfortable lead that it rode to the end to build a 1-0 lead in the match. The second set featured 11 ties throughout until Figueiredo and Shaw each racked up a pair of kills to pull away from John Brown, despite Meyer landing five terminations in the set.

Davis and junior Kinzee Mayo jumpstarted the JBU offense in the fourth, as each added up a trio of terminations. Despite hitting .154, John Brown held SAGU to a mere .098 (128-41) as five blocks, a pair from sophomore Taylor Glover, frustrated the Lion offense.

Glover added eight kills in the loss, as did Davis. Beck finished with seven terminations, 16 assits and eight digs.

Figueiredo and Shaw each clinched doubledoubles. Figueiredo had a match-best 19 kills and 17 digs while Shaw added 15 kills of her own to accompany 14 digs.

The Golden Eagles returned to action Tuesday against Randall (Okla.) in a nonconference match. Results were not available at presstime. The match was originally scheduled to feature Bacone (Okla.).

JBU is back in action at home Friday against Central Christian (Kan.) at 7 p.m. at Bill George Arena, followed by a home conference match against Langstron (Okla.) at 1 p.m. Saturday.