Missouri State secured the outright Missouri Valley Conference volleyball title Sunday afternoon with a 25-21, 25-23, 25-21 win over Drake on Senior Day at Hammons Student Center.
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The Bears (24-5, 16-0 MVC) claimed their fifth regular-season MVC title and set a new mark for the school’s best conference start in school history, extending their Valley winning streak to 32 matches and equaling last season’s 17-match overall win streak for the fifth-longest in school history.
Missouri State served three early aces to help gain a 10-6 lead in the first set, and led 13-7 after Lily Johnson landed two of her match-high 20 kills. The Bulldogs (23-8, 12-5) ripped off a 6-0 run for a 14-14 tie, and the Bears answered with three straight kills for a 17-14 advantage. Drake closed to 17-16, and the teams sided out until Brianne Dixon’s ace held serve for 22-19. DU pulled to 23-21, and Johnson fired her eighth and ninth kills of the set for the win.
Drake’s 10-7 lead was the largest for either team in the early-going of the second period, and the Bears battled back to take the upper hand at 16-15 on an Aubrey Cheffey kill. The score was tied four more times until Johnson hit kills on either side of a MacKenzie Irwin block to make it 23-20. The Bulldogs twice served for the tie, but Johnson and Cheffey met each with a kill for the two-point win.
The Bears piled up 10 quick kills for a 10-5 advantage in the third, and led by multiple points until Drake closed to 17-16. A pair of DU errors made it 19-16, and the teams sided out to 24-21 when Cambree Villarreal‘s stuff block secured the championship for the Bears.
MSU hit .289 in the match compared to .204 for the Bulldogs and owned leads of 49-46 in kills, 66-64 in digs and 5-1 in aces. Emily Butters scooped 21 digs and Daniele Messa had a double-double with 30 assists and 10 digs.
MSU closes the regular season on the road with matches at Valparaiso on Friday and Loyola on Saturday.
