Southeast volleyball secures five set win at home

The Southeast volleyball team defeated Tennessee Tech on Saturday, Oct. 6, to secure its 12th win, which is a season best in the past four seasons.

The Redhawks edged the Golden Eagles by two points in the fifth set after claiming the match’s opening two sets, ultimately winning 25-16, 25-22, 22-25, 23-25, 15-13.

Junior outside hitter Annie Wehrheim had a career best 24 kills for Southeast during the match. She had six kills in both the second and fifth set.

Southeast coach Julie Yankus stressed better individual matchups before and during the game.

“We knew we could attack over their setter, because she’s a smaller block when she’s up there and we definitely wanted to attack her,” Yankus said. “We had Annie matched up with her and she had an amazing performance today and she took advantage of that small block.”

The Redhawks took the first set with senior rightside hitter Haley Bilbruck leading the way with six kills and three digs. There were no lead changes during the set as Southeast controlled the set and kept the Golden Eagles at a distance.

In the second set, Annie Wehrheim led the Redhawks with six kills on 11 total attempts, and Laney Malloy had three kills and four digs.

The Golden Eagles won the next two sets.

When the team prepared to enter the fifth set, Yankus reminded her players that it was familiar territory since the Redhawks had played five sets six times prior during the season.

“The first thing I said to them was that we’ve been here before, and we’ve somehow decided that we like going to five, and we’ve played this kind of game a few times,” Yankus said. “Now we can confidently go out there, we don’t need to play scared and timid and go out there and continue to play our game.”

All the way until the last few points in the set, both teams stayed within reach of each other as there were five lead changes. With the score tied 13-13, the Golden Eagles committed two attack errors to seal the victory for the redhawks.

One player who had a key part in the Redhawks victory was sophomore outside hitter Laney Malloy, who had 13 kills,18 digs and six blocks. Setter Claire Ochs had 54 assists as well as 14 digs, and junior middle blocker Krista Berns had six blocks.

Southeast’s next game will be on Friday, Oct. 12 where they hit the road to Kentucky for a 5 p.m. contest against the Eastern Kentucky Colonels (3-15 overall, 2-4 OVC).