Box Score WASHINGTON, D.C. – After two back-and-forth battles during set one and two, the North Carolina Central University volleyball team fell in three to the Howard Bison (27-25, 25-21, 25-10) on Tuesday, Sept. 10 inside Burr Gymnasium on the campus of Howard, in Washington. D.C.

After Howard scored first in set one, the Eagles scored the next five. The remainder of set one continued a battle between both teams seeing nine ties and six lead changes before the Bison pulled ahead winning 27-25.

Howard started set two on a 4-0 before the Eagles tied the game at 12. The Eagles dropped a close second match after an additional seven ties and two lead changes, 25-21.

NCCU never seemed to recover from the second set defeat, as Howard cruised to a third set victory, 25-10, and took how the 3-0 match.

The Eagles were topped by senior Kalin Russell who finished with eight kills and three blocks. Freshman Kelsey Murphy contributed six kills and nine digs while junior libero Emily Eswonia collected 10 digs and junior setter Alice Genna handed out 13 assists.

Howard was led by Assata Conway with a match-high 12 kills. Megan Lagerlef added 11 kills  while Allyson Lods recorded 12 digs and Stephanie Shultis distributed 38 assists.

NCCU travels to Elon, N.C., on Friday afternoon for the Elon Phoenix Classic hosted by Elon University. The Eagles open with East Carolina on Friday at 4:30 p.m. (Sept. 13) followed by a 12:30 p.m., contest versus Elon and a 4:30 p.m., match-up versus Gardner-Webb on Saturday (Sept. 14).