Nov. 14, 2009

Box Score

PHILADELPHIA - No. 20 Saint Louis escaped a tough match at Temple with a 23-25, 32-30, 25-22, 25-17 win and a share of its third Atlantic 10 Conference regular-season title in the last four seasons. Megan Boken led the Billikens with a career-high 20 kills and Whitney Roth turned in the second 20+ dig match of her career as SLU (22-6 overall) finished 14-1 in league play. This is the second time since 2006 that the Bills have finished tied with Dayton atop the A-10 standings.

Boken hit at a .378 clip and committed just three errors, while also tallying six digs. Roth completed a double-double with 54 assist and a match-high tying 23 digs, while also adding two aces and two blocks. Sammi McCloud registered a double-double with 11 kills and 11 digs to go with four assists, two aces and two blocks. Bridget Fonke almost gave SLU three players with double-doubles with 10 kills and nine digs along with two aces. Casey Chernin contributed eight kills and two blocks and Whitney Behrens collected 17 digs and two aces.

The Owls scored the first three points of the opening set before Saint Louis knotted the score at 4-4. TU scored the next point but the Bills took advantage of a Temple error and a Boken kill to claim their first lead at 6-5. SLU was up 14-11 when the Owls were able to record four of the next five points in the set to tie things up at 15-15. The teams endured five ties before Temple went up 22-20 on consecutive kills from Jasmin Waters and Jovana Radojevic. A Boken kill trimmed the margin to one but back-to-back Billiken errors gave TU its first chance at set point. McCloud terminated and then served an ace to cut the score to 24-23 and prevent the Owls from earning the win. But Radojevic managed to put down a kill to give her team the one-set lead. Temple outhit SLU .225 to .122, as Boken registered a set-high tying five kills.

Saint Louis and Temple tied 13 times in the second set the lead changed hands five times before the Billikens came out on top to tie the match at one set apiece. The teams tied six times en route to a 7-7 score. Then SLU broke ahead on a Deno kill and two Temple hitting errors. The Bills built a lead of 15-10 after getting kills from Deno and Boken and a block from McCloud and Chernin as well as two more Owl hitting miscues. Two kills from Yun Yi Zhang and two SLU hitting errors cut the Owls' deficit to one at 15-14. However, Temple was unable to bring the set to a stalemate. Saint Louis was up 20-19 when it exploded for four points. A Boken kill started the rally and was followed by a Roth termination. Then a bad set by Temple and another Boken kill appeared to put the Billikens in control of the set at 24-19. But TU got contributions from four different players as it put the next six points on the board to earn a 25-24 edge. The next time SLU led was when McCloud and Fonke record back-to-back kills for a 27-26 lead. Temple was unable to end the set when it had the next two attempts at set point. Boken's kill gave the Bills the 30-29 advantage but an Ashley Clark kill re-tied the score. Finally Saint Louis scored consecutive points on kills from Boken and McCloud to complete the second set. The Billikens hit .200, while the Owls managed a .167 hitting percentage. Zhang led all players with 10 kills, while Boken led SLU with eight.

Temple responded to its set-two loss by taking a commanding lead in the third set. The Owls scored the first two points and cruised from there using small runs to build a lead of 14-8. Saint Louis put together a 5-1 run to cut it to 15-13. But TU was able to score the next three points to push the margin back out to five at 18-13. A Fonke kill and a kill and an ace from Boken made it 18-16 before a Billiken service error halted the spurt. But Fonke terminated and McCloud served an ace to get SLU to within one point, at 19-18, for the first time since it was 2-1. Temple scored out of a timeout prior to a 4-0 charge that put the Billikens on top for good at 22-20. The Owls scored the ensuing point to trim the margin to one but that was as close as they would get the rest of the way. SLU claimed the victory despite being outhit .268 to .191, and Temple posting three blocks to none from the Billikens.

Saint Louis got back to Billiken volleyball in the final set. Fonke pounded home a kill and served an ace before a Temple hitting error and combo block from Deno and Chernin gave SLU a 4-0 lead that it would not relinquish. A SLU hitting error interrupted the rally and was followed by a kill and a solo block from Boken to make it 6-1. The Bills let the margin dwindle down to one on just two occasions at 7-6 and 8-7. Saint Louis finished the set on a 6-1, which included three straight kills from Chernin for points 21, 22 and 23. The Billikens put up three blocks and hit at a .243 rate in the final set to Temple's .083 hitting percentage.