Ottawa finished the Pirate Invitational with a record of 1-3. The Braves were defeated by Westcliff (3-2), Rio Grande (3-1), and Missouri S&T (3-0). OU rebounded to take a 3-2 win over Brescia in its final match of the invitational.
OU finished the invitational with 190 kills, a .149 attacking percentage, 184 assists, 19 service aces, 216 digs, and 41 team blocks.
Akeil Williams led OU with 49 kills,
Kade Zrna finished with 91 assists,
Max Baumann tallied 42 digs, and Williams had 27 blocks.
In the win over Brescia last Saturday, Ottawa tied the school record for digs in a match with 71.
Akeil Williams set a new school record for blocks in a match with 12 in a loss to Westcliff last Friday. He also recorded the program's third triple-double: 11 kills, 12 digs, 12 blocks against Westcliff.
Akeil Williams leads the Braves in kills per set (2.88), Zrna Kade is OU's leader in assists (5.3) per set,
Max Baumann is the team's leader in digs (2.4) per set, and Williams leads the Braves in blocks (1.5) per set.
Friday will be the 14th meeting between Ottawa University and Missouri Baptist University. MBU leads the series, 13-0. The Spartans won the match last season on Jan. 28 in Wilson Field House, 3-0. Missouri Baptist and Ottawa met for the first time on March 4, 2016 in St. Louis. MBU won the match 3-0.
This is the first meeting between Ottawa University and University of Health Sciences & Pharmacy in St. Louis (UHSP).
Missouri Baptist University has an overall record of 4-0 and is ranked no. 12 in the NAIA. The Spartans opened the season with wins over St. Ambrose (3-0), Calumet (3-0), Kansas Wesleyan (3-0), and Central Christian (3-0) last weekend.
This season MBU is averaging 13.9 kills, 12.8 assists, 1.5 blocks, 3.6 service aces, and 9.3 digs per set. The Spartans are ranked sixth in the NAIA in kills (167), second in kills per set (13.9), first in attacking percentage (.383), sixth in assists (154), second in assists per set (12.8), first in service aces (44), fifth in service errors (61), first in service aces per set (3.6), and seventh in ball handling errors (2).
Aleksa Mandic leads MBU in kills per set (4.33), David Rudic is the Spartans' leader in assists (10.8) per set, Marko Jovanovic is the team's leader in digs (3) per set, Veljko Culibrk is MBU's leader in blocks (0.8) per set.
UHSP has started off the season 4-0 with wins last weekend over Kansas Wesleyan (3-2), Central Christian (3-0), St. Ambrose (3-0), and Calumet (3-0).
This season, UHSP is averaging 12.1 kills, 11.4 assists, 2.1 blocks, 2.3 service aces, and 9.5 digs per set. They had a .365 attacking percentage.
UHSP is ranked fifth in the NAIA in kills (169), fifth in attacking percentage (.365), fifth in assists (160), ninth in assists per set (11.4), 33rd in service aces (33), seventh in service aces per set (2.3), eight in digs (133), fifth in block assists (42), ninth in total blocks (30), seventh in block errors (6), fourth in points (232), and eighth in points per set (16.6).
Grant Hoover leads UHSP in kills per set (3.4), Cole Cwiklowski is the team's leader in assists (9.8), Xavier Gamayo leads the team in digs (3.1) per set, and Marcus Parker lead UHSP in blocks (1.1) per set.
