By Jocelyn VerVelde, Sports Information Coordinator

RICHMOND, Ky. – The Tennessee Tech volleyball team dropped its Ohio Valley Conference match at Eastern Kentucky on Friday night, as the host Colonels won in three sets, 25-16, 25-14, 25-19.

Juniors Ellen Conti and Madison Keyes were offensive bright spots for the Golden Eagles. Conti put down seven kills, while only making one error to hit an outstanding .500. Keyes put down six kills and only made one hitting error as well, for a clip of .312. Senior setter Ashleigh Hancock added 27 assists, while junior libero Courtney Smith tallied a match-high 13 digs. Junior Allison May added seven digs and tallied a team-high four aces.

The Colonels maintained momentum through the entire match as they were led by outside hitter Ashley Edmond who put down a match-high 13 kills while maintaining a .308 hitting percentage. As a team, EKU put down 40 kills and hit a blistering .365 for the match.

Tech's offense was unable to keep up with the hard-hitting Colonels as they were held to just 30 kills and a low hitting percentage of .161 in the match.

With Tech down two sets to none following the intermission, the Golden Eagles were not going to give up easy. Tying set three at 15 a piece on a seven-point service run by Conti, the Golden Eagles were able to achieve their closest point total in the entire match. EKU went up 19-16, with Tech closing the gap again at 19-19, but from there the Colonels took over, winning the set 25-19 and closing out the match.

The Golden Eagles are back in action on Saturday at 1 p.m. CDT as they travel to Morehead State.