This weekend, Missouri Southern’s volleyball team headed to St. Charles, Mo. to take on Lindenwood University.

Southern had nine kills and sophomore hitter Katie Politte had 12 digs, but that wasn’t enough to defeat Lindenwood as the Lions fell in three sets.

Individual set scores were 17-25, 13-25 and 14-25. Southern (0-16, 0-7 MIAA) had six kills from freshman Payton Graves to go with Politte’s nine, while sophomore Danielle Severns added five of her own.

Freshman Abby Finder dished out 23 assists, while sophomore Sydney Potts had seven digs.

“We all struggled at Lindenwood,” Head Coach Trish Knight said.

“Frustration set in and we just couldn’t catch a break. Against SBU I saw a lot of good things out of all of them. Everyone contributed.”

Lindenwood (9-7, 2-4 MIAA) was led by Kelsey Kennedy and Erin Anselman as the duo had nine kills each. Emma Brydels had 24 assists, while Kaila Schrimpf had 12 digs.

Southern returned back home on Tuesday to take on Southwest Baptist University.

Southern played a close game, three sets to one, but that wasn’t enough to take the victory.

Individual set scores were 22-25, 13-25, 25-19, and 20-25.

The Lions dropped 12-3 in the first set, but fought back to cut the score to 14-11, forcing an SBU (5-12, 1-6 MIAA) timeout.

Set two was all SBU as the Bearcats hit .304 to the Lions’ .226. Despite the first two, Southern led the entire set in the third and held SBU to just seven kills and six errors for an average of .032 to win that set.

In the fourth, SBU went ahead 11-8, forcing a Southern timeout. After that, SBU went on a 12-7 run to close it out.

“Over the weekend was a struggle,” Knight said.

“We had a few issues within the team that we had to solve. They have worked those out so it was good to see us grow from adversity. I felt our effort against SBU was really good. We fought hard and if we keep doing that, good things will happen.”

Freshman Callie Whetstone led the Lions with 11 kills and a .471 attack average.

Finder had 34 assists, while Freshman Kaycia Fry had a team-high 10 digs.

Severns had eight kills, while Sydney Potts and Politte had nine digs each.

“I hope we can build on the one set that we won,” Knight said.

“I saw them start to feel good about themselves and they really want to win. The most important thing I saw was the smiles on their faces. It was so good to see them truly enjoy playing.

“Most teams in our situation would just go through the motions and give up. This is a good group of kids. I really believe they will be something to watch with one more year of maturity.”

This weekend, the Lions will take on Henderson State and Southern Arkansas at Southwest Baptist.