Box Score

WILMINGTON, N.C. – Despite a double-double from senior Lauren Copenhagen, the Elon University volleyball team fell in four sets on Friday afternoon on day one of the UNC Wilmington Hilton Garden Inn Invitational, dropping a 3-1 (20-25, 25-22, 29-31, 15-25) decision to the Campbell Camels.

Elon drops to 7-6 on the year with the loss, while Campbell improves to 3-10 with the win.

"We worked a lot on passing and blocking this week in practice and I was very happy with how that has improved,” said Elon head coach Mary Tendler. “Unfortunately, we made too many hitting errors to win the match today. We look to turn that around tomorrow.”

Copenhagen finished tied for the team lead in kills with 11, while also tallying 14 digs.

Junior Caroline Lemke registered 11 kills in the loss, while junior Ali Deatsch led all players with 19 digs. Not far behind, senior Lizzie West recorded a season-high 15 digs for the Phoenix.

With the match knotted at 1-1 after the first two sets of the day, Elon found itself down five points, 22-17, late in the third set. However, the Phoenix battled back to tie the game at 22-all and gain momentum after a pair of Campbell errors and three kills in a row by sophomore Allison Johnson.

But after the two squads traded point-for-point to make it a 29-29 game, the Camels would eventually tally back-to-back points to win the set, 31-29, after an Elon error and kill from Campbell’s Caitlin Bendy put the Phoenix behind, 2-1, in the match.

The Camels would carry the momentum into the fourth and final set of the match, closing the match on a 12-5 run to hand Elon the setback.

Elon out-blocked Campbell, 11-7.5 in the loss, but the Phoenix hit just .042 as a team against the Camels.

Elon concludes action in Wilmington tomorrow with a pair of matches versus UNC Wilmington and NC State.

--ELON--