Eureka College junior outside hitter Kelli Dunne put down a game-high 11 kills and senior middle blocker Brittany Feger set a new career-high with four service aces, leading the Red Devils to a 25-17, 25-15, 25-15 St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference victory over Blackburn, Tuesday night at the Reagan Center. Dunne’s first two kills of the match gave the Red Devils (2-8, 1-2 SLIAC) a 2-1 lead in the first game, a lead the Red Devils would hold on to for a large portion of the game. After the visitors forced a 15-15 tie and a Eureka timeout, the Red Devils closed the set with a flurry to take an early lead in the match. A Blackburn attack error ignited a 10-2 Eureka run to end the game, and senior middle blocker Paige Fannon capped the surge for the hosts when her kill secured the Red Devils’ 25-17 win. Eureka trailed only once in the final game of the match. Smith’s service ace gave the Beavers a 6-5 lead before Eureka junior Shari Steidinger and senior Annette Crady put down consecutive kills to push the Red Devils back in front. After Eureka stretched its lead to four (15-11), the Beavers gave one final push and pulled within a point (15-14) on a Eureka attack error.
-Bob
Bradley served up eight aces and limited Nebraska-Omaha to a .138 attack percentage as the Braves improved to 2-0 on the season with a 25-13, 25-20, 25-23 victory against the Mavericks Saturday morning at Renaissance Coliseum to open the second day of play at the CEFCU Classic. Junior Madelyn Ervin matched a career-high with three aces and sophomore Alise Tupuritis tallied a match-high 11 kills to help pace the Braves, who opened the season with a 2-0 record for the third consecutive year.
-Bob
The inaugural Bradley Braves Community Nights tour will concluded when the Braves visited Five Points in Washington, IL. First-year men’s basketball coach Geno Ford was joined by veteran soccer coach Jim DeRose during Thursday’s event. Hall-of-Fame “Voice of the Braves” Dave Snell emceed the evenings speaking program. Other features of Thursday’s Bradley Braves Community Night event included meeting with Bradley men’s basketball and soccer players, as well as other student-athletes and coaches, discounted tickets to Community Night games for each of Bradley’s five ticketed sports (baseball, men’s basketball, women’s basketball, soccer and volleyball), family-friendly activities and door prizes to include Bradley Basketball season tickets, autographed items. The Bradley marketing department, players and coaching staff should be giving a lot of credit for there hard work and putting together the community events this week.
-Bob
The inaugural Bradley Braves Community Nights tour will tipped off Monday evening when Bradley coaches, staff and student-athletes visited the Avanti’s Dome in Pekin. It was a tremendous turn-out as the athletes and coaches signed lots of autographs and interacted with all of there many fans. There were also several door prizes given away during the night. Next stop is Tuesday at Hickory Grove Park in Dunlap and Thursday at Five Points in Washington.
-Bob
Sophomore Madelyn Ervin (Lewis Center, Ohio/Olentangy) tallied a season-high 15 kills and freshman Amy Angelos (Waukegan, Ill./Waukegan) matched Ervin with 15 kills of her own to help Bradley to five-set victory (25-19, 14-25, 25-19, 23-25, 15-9) against Indiana State Saturday at Renaissance Coliseum. The win was the Braves fourth in the last six matches and Bradley closed out the home slate with wins in three of the last four matches at Renaissance Coliseum.
-Bob
