Avery Skinner and Alli Stumler Each Notch 15 Kills, UK Sweeps LSU
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Outside hitters Avery Skinner and Alli Stumler slammed 15 kills each with sophomore Azhani Tealer stuffing a career-high nine blocks to lead the No. 3 Kentucky Volleyball team to another 3-0 sweep (25-13, 25-19, 25-22) over the LSU Tigers on Saturday night in Memorial Coliseum.
Skinner, a senior from Katy Texas, had 15 kills on the night to go along with four digs and two blocks to complete one of her best all-around matches of the season. Stumler, who went for 19 kills on Friday night, backed her stellar performance with 15 kills on Saturday to go along with 10 digs for her sixth double-double this season.
Tealer’s big blue blocks set a new career high by one, surpassing the eight she had set earlier in the 2020-21 season.
Alli Stumer also had 10 digs for the night, tying with liberos Lauren Tharp and Gabby Curry for the team lead in digs on the night.
Kentucky as a team hit .387 on the night and its defense held the potent LSU offense to just .149 in the match.
With Saturday night’s result, UK improves to 14-0 and remains as the only undefeated team remaining in the 2020-21 Southeastern Conference season. UK currently holds a two-match lead on second-place Florida.
Dating back to the first set against Missouri back in October, Kentucky with Saturday night’s result has now won 33 sets in a row.
Kentucky will stay at home next week, hosting the Ole Miss Rebels for a two-match Southeastern Conference series at Memorial Coliseum. Friday night’s match will be at 7 p.m. ET, with Saturday’s match at 5 p.m. ET. Both will air on the SEC Network+, ESPN3 and the ESPN app with Dick Gabriel and Kathy DeBoer on the call.
Tickets for the Ole Miss series are still available by accessing UKathletics.com/tickets.
Set One
With Azhani Tealer’s fourth block inside of the first 18 points in the match, LSU needed a timeout with Kentucky leading, 12-6 and doubling up the Tigers. Kentucky’s lead was extended to eight points on a powerful termination by Madi Skinner to make it 15-7 as Skinner notched her first kill of the match. Kentucky began to run away in the middle stanza, winning four straight and forcing the Tigers into a halt of play, trailing 18-9 to UK. The Wildcats won the set on a service error. In the opening set, UK hit .370, but it was a story of defense as LSU hit -.067 and UK had six blocks. Alli Stumler led UK with five kills, and Tealer had three to go along with her six blocks.
Set Two
After a tight opening part of the set, Kentucky gained a bit of traction midway through the second and behind kills from A. Skinner and a dump by Madison Lilley, the Wildcats began to pull away. What was a 7-7 set turned into 15-11 UK at the media timeout, and Kentucky played add-on in the next point as Stumler terminated a ball from the back row. LSU pulled to within two as it won three of four points, but a timely kill from A. Skinner stopped the bleeding and reinstated the Kentucky lead to 18-14. LSU won back-to-back points to pull closer at 20-18 and UK called its first timeout. Stumler helped UK side out on the next point with a kill from the left side. Rutherford’s second kill of the set ended the frame with UK winning five of the final six points to close things out, 25-19.
Set Three
Avery Skinner put her match-high 12th kill to the floor midway through the set to give Kentucky a 12-6 lead and LSU called its first timeout of the set with UK doubling up the Tigers. LSU cut the lead to as few as three at 15-12, but a big swing by redshirt freshman Bella Bell got UK out of a jam in a long rally and killed her first ball of the night. LSU pulled to within one point at 23-22 before Kentucky called a timeout to regroup, and won the final two points of the match to take the third set, 25-22.
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