Lizzie Carr Drives No. 3 Kentucky Past Georgia, 3-0
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Junior middle blocker Lizzie Carr had a career-high 13 kills Friday night as No. 3 Kentucky drove past Georgia 3-0 (25-13, 25-13, 25-12) inside Historic Memorial Coliseum.
UK hit a monstrous .368 for the match as a team as Carr was joined by Eva Hudson and Brooklyn DeLeye who all had double-figure kills Friday night, but it was the Wildcats defense that told the story as UK held Georgia to a -.021 hitting percentage for the match, the first time UK has held an opponent in the negatives all season. Georgia had 20 kills and 22 errors on the night with Kentucky’s block recording 11 stuffs in the match led by Lizzie Carr’s seventh on her career-best night.
Kassie O’Brien had 34 assists for Kentucky, throwing in a kill and eight digs as well in the match. O’Brien assisted on all but eight of Kentucky’s 42 kills as a team as UK hit .368 with 42 kills opposed to only 10 errors and 87 swings as a team. Kentucky had four service aces in the match with two coming off the hand of Ava Sarafa in the third set as UK began to run away and hide from the Bulldogs.
With the result Friday, Kentucky is now 9-2 on the season and sits atop the Southeastern Conference with a 2-0 league record through the first week of SEC play. Georgia falls to 8-4 overall in 2025 and is 0-2 in league action after a loss to No. 22 Tennessee on Wednesday night in Knoxville.
Kentucky will now take the rest of the weekend off before opening its SEC road slate of games next Friday night at Ole Miss in Oxford. The match will begin at 7 p.m. ET and will be shown live on the SEC Network and ESPN app.
Set 1
Kentucky took set one by a large margin, racing out to a 9-1 lead thanks to the elite serving of Ava Sarafa, who won seven points in a row on her service run to make things swing in UK’s favor. The Wildcats hit .419 en route to a 25-13 opening set win as UK held Georgia to .000 as a team with seven kills and seven errors on its 30 swings in the set. On the early run, it was Lizzie Carr who made the difference as she had five kills on six swings with no errors before Georgia took its first timeout at 8-1 and then the Wildcats were off and running to the finish line of the set. It was a termination from Eva Hudson, her team-leading sixth of the set that pushed UK across the line on a supreme cross-court kill based on the left side to make things 25-13. UK as a team only had one error in the entire set on its 29 swings with 16 kills and four stuff blocks to accompany.
Set 2
Set two was much of the same for the Wildcats, who took the second set by an identical scoreline as the opener, 25-13. Kentucky jumped in front 7-3 to take a four-point lead after the teams traded early sideouts before slowly beginning to run away from the Bulldogs, who took a timeout trailing 14-9 as the lead for UK ballooned to five points for the first time all set. The lead grew to eight at 18-10 following an attack error by the Bulldogs, their 12th of the match and that prompted the final timeout of the set by UGA. In the late stages of the set, Kentucky increased its lead to 10 for the first time all set at 22-12 on a kill by Brooklyn DeLeye with a touch off the block for her sixth kill of the match and closed things out with Eva Hudson’s 11th kill, 25-13. UK hit .344 in the set with 15 kills on 32 swings and the UK defense held the Bulldogs to .027 in the frame as Georgia hit .015 as a team through the first two sets with UGA having 15 kills and 14 errors on 67 swings.
Set 3
Ava Sarafa began the third set with a sideout and back-to-back aces at the service line to give the Wildcats an early 3-0 advantage. Georgia took an early timeout following a block by Kassie O’Brien and Jordyn Dailey on the right side to push the UK lead to 8-3 and the Wildcats forced the UGA hand a few points later into calling its final timeout with Kentucky ahead by a set-high five points again at 13-8 after Kennedy Washington teamed with O’Brien to stuff a UGA attack for its 17th attack error on the night as a team. Kennedy Washington netted her second kill of the match to get Kentucky to match point and an attack error ended the proceedings by the Bulldogs to close out the frame, 25-12 as UK won the final four points.
For the latest on UK Volleyball, follow the Wildcats on Twitter and Instagram at @KentuckyVB.
