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Eagles Down River Hawks to Advance to Landmark Conference Championship

Eagles Down River Hawks to Advance to Landmark Conference Championship

HUNTINGDON, Pa.- The #2 Juniata women's volleyball team dropped the first set against Susquehanna University in the Landmark Conference semifinals before dominating the following three sets to advance to the Landmark Championship, Wednesday evening inside Memorial Gymnasium. It is the 20th consecutive victory for the Eagles. 

The first set was tight early, with the Eagles holding a 12-9 lead after a kill from Courtney Williams. The River Hawks would eventually pull even at 13-13 and traded points for a while before the visitors took six straight points to make it 21-15. Juniata tried to claw their way back, including fighting off two set points to make it 22-24; SU got the kill they needed to take set one 22-25.

The Eagles used 5-0 surges and later three straight points as a kill from Williams, another from Lily Podolan, and an ace from Olivia Foley made it 12-4 early in the second set. Juniata didn't let up as they essentially stuck a fork in the set with the score at 13-6. Two kills from Mackenzie Coley, one from Williams, two aces from Kiona Sky Rousset-Hernandez, and an SU attack error made it 19-6. Juniata would take the set on three consecutive kills from Audrey Muth, 25-9. Juniata hit .464 in the set.

The third set saw Juniata continue to overwhelm Susquehanna as they used an early 8-0 surge to charge ahead 14-3 and never look back. A Podolan kill ended the set 25-13. Juniata hit .542 to take a 2-1 lead in the match.

Susquehanna hung around as they tried to push the match to five, narrowing the JC lead to two at 17-15. Two straight kills from Podolan and a block from Williams and Podolan made it 20-15. SU took the next point via an Eagle service error, but that was their final point of the match. Williams tallied her ninth kill of the match, Podolan put down her 13th and 14th kills of the match, Kennedy Christy got in on the fun with a kill of her own to give JC match point before Podolan notched kill 15 to punch the Eagles' ticket to the championship game.

Foley had the offense humming as she amassed 52 assists

Juniata will host the University of Scranton in the Landmark Conference Championship Saturday at 7:00. This will be the third meeting between the two teams in the conference championship.