St. Charles, MO- Western Illinois dropped their mid-week matchup against Lindenwood in four sets. Keyana Cruse had 20 kills to lead the attack, followed by Brittany Wulf (14 kills) and Julianna Schmidt (9 kills). Schmidt had a hitting percentage of .500 which was a team-high. Despite the loss, Maggie Craker surpassed 3,000 career assists on Tuesday night, finishing with a team-high 49 assists. Craker now moves into fourth all-time in program history for career assists.
The Leathernecks started out strong in set going up 9-4 to start. Keyana Cruse would have the first three kills for WIU and Grace Kremer, Grace Ulatowski, and Elizabeth Ziegler would each have a kill to highlight the 9-4 run. Later in the set, Lindenwood would go on a 10-2 run to take the set lead at 16-13. The Lions would go up 19-14 for their largest lead in set one. Trailing 22-19 late in the set, the Leathernecks would go on a 6-1 run to close out the first set. Julianna Schmidt would have two kills and Keyana Cruse would have three kills as WIU would take set one by a score of 25-23.
Set two was close throughout and saw the Leathernecks have several leads. Trailing 18-15, the Lions would go on a 4-0 run to take the set lead at 19-18. The two sides would go back-and-forth the rest of the set and Lindenwood would close out the second set on a 3-0 run to win the set 25-23. Keyana Cruse would have five kills and Julianna Schmidt would have three kills in the set for WIU.
The Leathernecks would also have a lead late in set three at 19-18. Lindenwood would again go on a late run and would close out set three on a 7-2 run winning the third set 25-21. Set four saw Lindenwood go up by several points at two different points in the set and they would go on to take the fourth set by a score of 25-17 and take the match three sets to one. Brittany Wulf would have four kills in the set to lead the way for the Leatherneck offense.
WIU remains in fourth place in the Ohio Valley Conference with a record of 9-5. The Leathernecks will host Morehead State on Thursday and Friday for their final home matches inside Western Hall. Thursday's match is scheduled for 6 p.m. and Friday's match is scheduled for 2 p.m. Friday will be Senior day for WIU.
FOLLOW THE LEATHERNECKS
For all the latest information on Leatherneck Volleyball, please visit GoLeathernecks.com. For up-to-the-minute updates, follow the Leathernecks on X (formerly Twitter), Instagram and Facebook.
