The Eastern New Mexico volleyball team had a tough opening to its four-match road stand as the Hounds fell to St. Mary’s 3-0 (25-20, 25-18, 25-22) in non-conference action Friday afternoon.
The Hounds and Rattlers battled back and forth early on in the first set ENMU managed to take an 11-10 lead off a ball handling error by St. Mary’s. However, the Rattlers rallied with five straight to jump ahead, 15-11.
Eastern battled back later in the set, taking advantage of a pair of St. Mary’s miscues to climb to within two at 19-17, but could climb no closer as the Rattlers took set one, 25-20.
The Hounds kept the second set close early as the two teams traded the first six points. After St. Mary’s took a 3-2 lead, Jennifer Martinez tallied a kill to tie the match up at three apiece. The Rattlers scored the next two points to take the lead once again and were able to stretch the lead to three at 15-12 before Martinez tallied another kill and St. Mary’s committed an error to cut the Greyhound deficit to one.
The Rattlers took four of the next five points to stretch the lead back to 19-15, but the Hounds battled back by taking advantage of SMU attack error followed by a Martinez service ace, cutting the ENMU deficit to just two. However, the Hounds could not cut into the lead any further as the Rattlers closed out the set with a 6-1 run to come away with a 25-18 set win.
After falling behind 6-1 in the third set, Eastern put together a strong rally by taking six of the next eight points. Gannon, Christelle Kialanda and Julie Tucker each recorded kills to cut the deficit to 8-7, forcing the Rattlers to take a timeout.
St. Mary’s Rachel McDonald recorded a kill coming out of the timeout to stretch the lead back to 9-7, but the Hounds answered with a five-point rally that included kills by Martinez, Jaedynn Devoux and an Alba Ontiveros service ace, giving Eastern their largest lead of the set at 12-9.
The Rattlers managed to battle back to tie the set up at 13-all, but a pair of kills recorded by Gannon and Martinez gave the lead back to the Greyhounds at 15-13. St. Mary’s put together yet another rally, taking three of the next four points to tie the match up at 16, but Kialanda followed it up with another kill to put the Hounds back up, 17-16.
Unfortunately, the Hounds could not keep the Rattlers down as St. Mary’s ended the set on a 9-5 run to hand Eastern a 25-22 set three defeat.
ENMU struggled to contain the SMU front line in the match as the Rattlers were able to finish with 45 kills on a .321 hitting percentage while the Hounds finished the match with 35 kills on a .134 hitting percentage.
Martinez led the Hounds attack with a career-best 12 kills on a .435 hitting percentage. It was the third consecutive match that Martinez recorded 11 or more kills on a .400 or better hitting percentage.
Kaitlyn Kluna dished out a team-high 19 assists while Ontiveros led the defensive back line with a team-best 15 digs.
The Hounds will return to Lone Star Conference play tomorrow at 1 p.m. as they will travel to Kingsville, Texas to take on Texas A&M-Kingsville.