Eutectics Win Five-Set Thriller on Senior Night

ST. LOUIS, MO. – The Eutectic women's volleyball team stretched out setter Jenna Brinson's senior night to five sets on Wednesday, coming away with their first win over the NCAA Division 3 Blackburn College Beavers (Ill.)(10-13) in seven years. After going up 2-0, the Eutectics dropped the next two before reclaiming the momentum in the deciding set.

MATCH HIGHLIGHTS:

UHSP def. Blackburn 25-20, 25-17, 18-25, 19-25, 15-10

• After falling behind 10-4 in the first set, the Eutectics were able to turn things around with a series of kills from Sumanpreet Kaur and a couple of well-timed aces from celebrated senior Jenna Brinson to tie it up at 13 apiece. Soon Hannah Kynaston got into the mix, knocking down kills set up by Brinson and combining with Kaur for two blocks for a six-point UHSP run to take a 20-15 lead they would not give up.
• The second set was close as well until Brinson took to the service line and served up six Eutectic points in a row to go up 23-15 – a lead that was too much for the Beavers to surmount.
• Blackburn was able to swing the momentum heavily in their favor early in the third set, going up 9-5 and holding the lead for the rest of the set. The Eutectics posted their highest kill percentage of the night with 15 kills on 50 attempts, but the Beavers far exceeded their expectations, knocking down 19 kills on 51 attempts with only one error to win the set.
• In Set 4, the Beavers were again able to take an early lead, winning seven points in a row to go up 9-3. The Eutectics could never quite catch up after that, allowing Blackburn's win to force a deciding fifth set.
• The two teams battled it out early in the fifth set, but with the score tied at 5-5, four Blackburn errors in a row gave the Eutectics an edge. The Eutectics' run included two solo blocks by Sierra Aplanalp helping to put Purple and Gold in good position to win the set and secure the match.
• Jenna Brinson picked up a whopping career-high 55 assists in the match to put her career total at 2,852 – just 17 short of the record set by Kaitlyn LaBoube back in 2014. With her additional 15 digs in the match notched her seventh double double of the season.
• An acrobatic MaKenzie Uribe had already picked up 10 digs after the first set, keeping the Eutectics in point after point. The Eutectic libero finished the match with a season-high 35 digs, while her fellow defenders Joleigh Parker and Ava Baggett also had peak performances, recording more than 20 digs each (26 and 21, respectively). The UHSP team recorded 129 digs in the match.
• Hannah Kynaston also netted a career-high performance with 18 kills on 50 attempts. Tera Schumacher and Sumanpreet Kaur also reached double digits in kills with 12 apiece. Kaur contributed four block assists and one solo block to the team's eight total.

UP NEXT:

Now 5-20 (4-6 AMC), the Eutectics will return to American Midwest Conference (AMC) competition on Saturday, when they play host to Mission University (Mo.)(9-16, 5-6 AMC) and Crowley's Ridge College (Mo.)(11-15, 8-1 AMC) on Saturday, at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. in the UHSP gymnasium.