Volleyball Loses Twice To Kennesaw State At Home

The Lady Flames volleyball team failed to capitalize on a strong blocking performance as they fell to Kennesaw State in the first game of a two-game series Feb. 19-20, with the Owls ultimately sweeping the Flames across both games. 

The Flames lost in four sets to their conference foe and the top ranked team in the ASUN Conference Friday. After losing the first set 25-14, the team kept the other sets close, losing 25-23 in the second, wining 25-21 in the third and losing 25-21 in the fourth. 

The first set began with a tight battle, with the teams locked in a 4-4 tie. The tides quickly changed, however, when the Owls produced a 7-1 run. For the remainder of the set, the Owls always managed to hold at least a three-point advantage. 

“Set one, we got smashed and I told them, ‘We can’t play any worse than this,” Head Coach Trevor Johnson said.

Liberty was able to bounce back with eight more kills and two fewer errors in the second set than the first. In this set, neither team led by more than three points. The Flames held a 23-21 lead before two errors by the Flames and two kills by the Owls resulted in a second set loss.

Though they were trailing 2-0, the Lady Flames started to find their rhythm in the third set – and their determination paid off as they cut the Owls lead down to 2-1. 

“I was so proud of the way we battled through those sets, especially the third set, just seeing the way everyone celebrated each other,” freshman Julia Mangum said. 

In the fourth set, however, the Owls struck back with a vengeance, tallying a game-high 17 kills and dispatching the Lady Flames – despite Liberty only committing two errors. The Lady Flames ended the game with a three-point streak for a score of 21-24 before Lauren Chastang’s kill ended the game, leaving the Lady Flames frustrated.

Chastang was a problem for the Lady Flames the entire match, ending the day with 17 kills. Even before the game, Johnson knew locking her down would be crucial – but Liberty could not find a way to keep her quiet.

“One of our goals was to shut down Lauren Chastang, and she just did her thing and you can only hope to contain her,” Johnson said. 

Redshirt senior Kainah Williams generated 11 kills for the Flames with a hit percentage of .471 (calculated by subtracting attack errors from kills and dividing by attack attempts). 

“Those are All-American numbers,” Johnson said about Williams’ performance. 

Mangum also contributed, with 14 kills and a .314 hit percentage.

“Really impressed with Julia, — she just keeps getting better and better,” Johnson said. “Anytime you can hit over a 240 for an outside, those are good numbers as well.”

One area in which the Lady Flames consistently struggled, however, was serving – and the Owls punished them. Liberty only scored once with a service ace and committed 12 service errors. Johnson acknowledged that his team would need to step up its serving game to improve on the Lady Flames current 2-5 record. 

“We needed to serve a little bit tougher, way too many service errors on our end,” Johnson said. “We just needed the ball (to be) in a bit more, and we could have made some runs.”

Even though the game did not have the ending the Flames desired, the team still demonstrated strength through the number of blocks it accumulated, posting 16 blocks against Kennesaw State’s seven. 

Despite the loss, the Flames were encouraged by how they played against Kennesaw State, which is currently undefeated (6-0). 

“I think it’s a huge confidence booster,” Mangum said. “I think we started off kind of hesitant in the beginning like, ‘Man, they’re a good team.’ But seeing that we took a set off of them and seeing how close the other sets were, it’s like ‘Okay, we’re capable of so much more than we give ourselves credit for.’”

“I think we were trying to feel them out a little bit too much that first set and then we realized that we could hang with them and play with them, so knowing that will help with our confidence going into that first set tomorrow,” Johnson said. 

In spite of the loss, the team still has set its hopes on winning the ASUN. 

“We have three more matches with them (Kennesaw State), we have a match with them tomorrow and in Atlanta again so we can rise above and take that spot,” Williams said. “It was good, they responded very well (to the first set) and I was proud of their fight,” Johnson said. “It’s still a young group, and we’re still trying to learn how to play together. They impress me every single day – regardless of the losses or the record we are getting a little better, and I’m excited to see what this team is going to look like come March and early April.”

The team lost again to the Owls on Saturday 3-1 to conclude the weekend series. Liberty will compete against the Owls again in its next game March 5. 

Christian Shields is a Copy Editor.