Last weekend the Eagles flew to Livonia, Michigan to participate in the Madonna Classic. They returned as tournament champs.
Not only were they the champions, but the lady Eagles dominated the entire two days of play, winning all four games by sweep. On top of that, junior outside hitter Meghan Warkentin was named the tournament’s MVP.
Also, sophomores Abbie Wright and Katie Stevens were recently named the GSAC Setter and Libero of the Week for Oct. 23-29.
After the women returned home, they brought their momentum when they visited No. 3 Concordia University on Tuesday.
The last time these two teams met, Concordia impressively handed Biola their first loss of the season in the form of a sweep.
Biola’s women came out in game one sluggish and found themselves down quickly by a score of 8-18. They fought back to get it as close as 27-29 until Concordia’s Amber Riden ended the game with a clutch kill.
Though they lost the first game, Biola came back to win the second game easily 30-19.
As game three started, the Eagles found themselves in a familiar spot as in game one, trailing 8-18, but again rallied to pull within one to make it 21-22.
But again, the final run was in favor of Concordia, and they took game three 24-30.
In game four, Biola battled back from a 12-17 deficit to tie the game at 27 all. The women were then able to capitalize on timely errors by Concordia and took game four 30-27.
When forced to play a game five, the Eagles were 2-1 on the season coming in. However, this Tuesday night, Concordia came out strong and never looked back, winning the final game 15-6.
This loss dropped Biola to 24-5 overall and 11-5 in GSAC play, while Concordia improved to 22-3 and 13-13 in conference action.
Even with the loss, Warkentin was satisfied with the team’s performance.
“We played really well, and it was a big improvement from the last time we played them,” she said. “But of course we are not going to be satisfied with a loss.”
She went on to say that even though they lost game four, they showed heart in being able to force a game five. Warkentin says she now has her eyes set on their rematch against No. 1 Fresno Pacific, who swept the Eagles on Sept. 25.
“We have a huge game on Wednesday against Fresno Pacific, so we need to take the good from tonight and move on to tomorrow,” she said.
