COLUMBIA, S.C. – The Benedict College Lady Tigers dropped their sixth straight match as Paine College rallied from a 2-1 deficit to take a 3-2 victory on Wednesday night in the Benjamin E. Mays HRC Arena.
Paine won the match 21-25, 25-17, 18-25, 25-23, 15-9 to improve to 12-8 overall and 8-6 in the SIAC. Benedict falls to 12-15 overall and 5-9 in the SIAC.
Playing without their top three front-line players, the Lady Tigers got double-figure kills from
Taylor Stephens and
Kiera Brothers with 10 kills each. Stephens matched her season high, while Brothers reached 10 kills for the second time in the past three matches.
Majda Cisic, one of Benedict's two seniors honored during their last home match of the season, added a season-high eight kills and had 21 digs, her second-highest total of the season.
Ashleigh Reeves also had a season-high with seven kills to go along with 17 assists and 18 digs.
Ka'Tia Wright also had a double-double with 16 assists and a season-high 13 digs.
Benedict trailed 3-1 early in the first set before surging out to a 17-8 lead. Paine later scored nine straight points to take a 20-19 lead. With the score tied at 21, Benedict closed out the set with back-to-back kills by Cisic and a service ace by Wright.
Paine scored the final five points to win the second set. Benedict scored six straight points late in the third set, getting a pair of kills by Reeves, and kills by Brothers and
Jasmine Wright, and a service ace by
Amber Scott.
The Lady Tigers had a 22-17 lead in the crucial fourth set after a four-point run, but Paine went on a 5-0 run to tie the set. Cisic scored a kill to give Benedict a 23-22 lead, but the Lady Lions scored the final three points to tie the match at 2-2.
Paine scored five of their first eight points in the deciding fifth set off of Benedict errors. The Lady Lions built a 12-5 lead before Benedict scored four straight points to cut the lead to 12-9, getting kills from Stephens and Brothers. Paine closed out the match with the final three points, all from kills.
Benedict closes out the regular season on Friday, traveling to Atlanta to take on Clark Atlanta.
