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Lauren Budde Eclipses 1,000-Career Kills as Volleyball Improves to 14-0
BOX 1 | BOX 2 | BUDDE INTERVIEW
Colorado Springs, Colo., September 17, 2011 – Senior middle hitter Lauren Budde notched the 1,000th kill of her career as the No. 2 Washington University in St. Louis volleyball team picked up 3-0 victories over No. 15 Concordia College-Moorhead (25-20, 25-17, 25-19) and Endicott College (25-10, 25-22, 25-10) to win the Molten Colorado College Invitational on Saturday, Sept. 17, in Colorado Springs, Colo.
Budde entered the day needing just eight kills to reach 1,000 and she did not take very long to reach the milestone. Behind six kills from Budde the Bears opened with a 25-20 win over Concordia-Moorhead, leaving her just two shy of 1,000.
The first set turned on a 3-0 scoring run from Washington U. to break a 12-12 tie. Junior setter Marilee Fisher notched a kill and an ace on consecutive plays and Budde blocked down an Ashley Beseman attack to put the Bears in front for good.
Budde’s 1,000th kill came on the fourth point of the second set, as Fisher found her with a pass on a slide to the right side that she pounded through Concordia’s late arriving block. She finished the match with 14 kills while hitting .367 with eight digs and five total blocks.
So far this season Budde has a team-high 151 kills, an average of 3.6 per set while hitting .419. She is also tied for the team lead with 37 total blocks and ranks third with 127 digs, a rate of 3.02 per set.
The Bears limited the Concordia attack to just a .089 hitting percentage in the second set, with Budde and sophomore outside hitter Meghan Byrne tallying four kills apiece.
The Cobbers jumped out to a 7-4 lead early on in the third, but a pair of kills from sophomore middle hitter Kaia Schwartz helped Washington University come back to regain an 8-7 lead. The set remained close until the final moments when the Bears used a 6-1 run to clinch a 25-19 win.
Washington University led just 19-18 when junior outside hitter Drew Hargrave recorded her eighth kill of the match to spark the WUSTL run. Another kill from Hargrave, one more from Budde and an ace by senior defensive specialist Tricia Brandt highlighted the action at the end of the match as the Bears wrapped up their sixth-straight win against a ranked opponent.
Hargrave had eight kills in the just the first set against Endicott, pacing the Bears to a 25-10 win. Schwartz starred in the middle in the Bears’ 25-22 second-set win, tallying three kills and a pair of solo blocks and Washington U. used a 9-0 run to start the third frame to cruise to another 25-10 win and complete the sweep.
Hargrave, Budde and senior outside hitter Kristen Thomas each had eight kills against Endicott as Washington University hit .393 as a team while limiting Endicott to a -.012 hitting percentage yielding just 19 kills in the match.
Budde finished the day with 22 kills and sits at 1,014 for her career. She also tallied 10 digs on the day and is now needs just 19 more to reach 1,000.
Washington U. (14-0) returns to action in two weeks when it will open University Athletic Association (UAA) competition in the first conference round robin weekend of the season, to be held Saturday-Sunday, Oct. 1-2, in St. Louis, Mo.
The Bears will face Carnegie Mellon University on Saturday at 10:30 a.m., and Brandeis University at 2:30 p.m.
