Box Score WISE, Va. – Behind a career-high 29 digs from junior libero Erin Lee the UVa-Wise women's volleyball team earned an exciting five-set win over the University of Charleston Tuesday night at the David J. Prior Convocation Center to open up Mountain East Conference play.
 
With the victory the Cavaliers (5-6, 1-0 MEC) start conference play with a win for the first time while being a MEC member. The 3-2 (25-21, 25-16, 20-25, 17-25, 16-14) win over the Golden Eagles (4-6, 0-1 MEC) stretches the Cavs home win streak to four spanning back to last season.
 
After taking the first two sets of the match the Cavs lost the next two before closing out the match in a very tightly contested fifth set.
 
Using 64 total kills, 61 assists and an attack percentage of .171 for the match the Cavs edged out Charleston, who hit .201 in the five sets while recording 56 kills and 55 assists.
 
UVa-Wise took the opening set 25-21 as the Cavs recorded an attack percentage of .343 and 20 total kills behind six kills from junior middle blocker Lindsey Tucker, and five kills and five digs from junior outside hitter Karley Allen. The Golden Eagles hit .250 for the set and only recorded seven digs, compared to 17 digs by the Cavs including eight by Lee alone.
 
Both teams' attack percentage dropped in the second set as the Cavs hit .182 and Charleston hit .133. Allen tallied six kills in the set while senior outside hitter Kelsey Smith and Lee recorded five digs each. UVa-Wise claimed a two sets to none lead by winning the second set 25-16.
 
The Cavs hitting really slowed down in both the third and fourth sets as UVa-Wise hit only .045 in the third compared to Charleston's .237. The Golden Eagles made 22 digs in the set while the Cavs recorded 18. Allen added another six kills and Lee made six more digs as UVa-Wise fell 25-20 in the set.
 
The fourth set proved even more challenging for the Cavs, who recorded an attack percentage of .065 and made 20 digs in the set. Charleston hit .205, tallied 23 digs and made three total blocks to take the fourth and force a fifth set. Freshman middle blocker Amanda Auxier led the Cavs in the set with five kills.
 
In the deciding fifth set the Cavs and Golden Eagles went back and forth before Charleston earned a match point at 14-13. A kill by Tucker that was originally called out led to a kill by Allen, giving the Cavs match point at 15-14. Charleston quickly called a timeout but an attack error on the Golden Eagles' Jordan Wittekind gave UVa-Wise the dramatic 16-14 fifth set win.
 
The Cavs hit .310 in the final set compared to the Eagles hitting .167. UVa-Wise got five kills from Allen and another four from Tucker in the last stanza of the match, while Smith and Lee added five digs.
 
UVa-Wise and Charleston each had five service aces in the match as the Cavs recorded 85 digs. The Golden Eagles tallied 82 digs in the five sets and got nine total blocks.
 
Allen led the Cavs offensively with 25 kills followed by Tucker with 16 and Auxier with 11. Defensively Lee's career-high 29 digs led the way, while junior outside hitter Erin Anderson and Smith made 13 digs each. Setter Chandler Rouse was only three assists off of her career-high as the freshman made 55 assists in the match.
 
The Golden Eagles were led by Wittekind on offense as she recorded 16 kills in the match, while Claire Lambert led on defense with 16 digs followed by Payton Logan with 14 and McKensie Milam with 13. Melissa Reyes tallied 35 assists for the Golden Eagles.
 
Allen is now only 38 kills away from becoming just the fourth Cav to ever reach 1,000 kills in her career.
 
"It was ugly out there tonight", Head Coach Kristen Salyer commented after the match. "We escaped with a win tonight without playing consistent. We've got to step up and have a little more consistency across the board. I thought we came out and played well in the first and second set, and then kind of took that third set off allowing them (Charleston) to gain momentum and then never really picked it up there."
 
"I thought we competed well in the fifth set but I don't think it should have ever gotten to that point either", added coach Salyer.
 
Charleston was picked to finish one spot above UVa-Wise in the MEC preseason poll as the Cavs were chosen ninth and the Golden Eagles eighth by a vote of the league's head coaches.
 
The Cavs will finish their three-game homestand Friday when they welcome another MEC foe to Wise in West Virginia State. The match is scheduled for a 7 p.m. start at the Prior Center.