STEUBENVILLE, Ohio – The Geneva College women's volleyball team had a successful trip to Ohio on Friday evening, sweeping the Franciscan Barons in straight set 25-15, 25-16, 25-19.  Geneva improved to 5-1 overall, 3-1 in the Presidents' Athletic Conference (PAC), while Franciscan fell to 1-2 overall, 1-2 in the PAC.

Senior Daphne Hunsinger (Harleysville, Pa./Christopher Dock) picked up two early kills to give the Golden Tornadoes a 3-0 lead in the first set.  Franciscan pulled to within 6-5, but Geneva answered with five straight points, two on kills by freshman Tess Neville (Lisbon, Ohio/Crestview), one a kill by junior Hannah Dusse (Plant City, Fla./Lakeland Christian), and another on an ace from sophomore Maggie Townsend (Beaver Falls, Pa./Beaver County Christian), extending the Golden Tornado lead to 11-5.  The Barons would respond with four straight points to pull within two, but back-to-back kills from Neville and Dusse pushed the lead back to four.  Franciscan would pull to within one, 14-13, but the the Golden Tornadoes finished off the set on an 11-2 run, with freshman Savannah Byers (Lancaster, Pa./Conestoga Valley) picking up a couple kills late to win the set 25-15.  Geneva hit an impressive .464 in the set.

The second set stayed close early on.  With Geneva leading 5-4, Franciscan scored five straight to take a 9-5 lead.  A moment later, a kill from Townsend started a run of four straight Geneva points to tie the score at 10-10.  The teams traded points over the next couple minutes, and after two straight Baron points, Franciscan led 16-14.  Those would be the last points of the set for the Baron.  The Golden Tornadoes reeled off an amazing 11 straight points, despite Franciscan calling both of its timeouts during the run, to win the set 25-16.  Byers had three kills in the stretch, with Geneva finishing with another impressive hitting percentage, .440.

The teams once again alternated points early in the third set, trading points back-and-forth until the score reached 7-7.  Geneva scored the next three points, though, the first time either team led by more than two points.  The Barons would pull to within 11-10, but back-to-back kills from Hunsinger, followed by back-to-back kills from Byers, were part of six straight Golden Tornado points which gave Geneva control of the set, 17-10.  The Golden Tornadoes finished off the match, 25-19, on a kill from Hunsinger.  Geneva hit .327 in the final set.

Hunsinger led the offense with a season-high 13 kills.  She narrowly missed a triple-double, finishing with 14 assists and eight digs.  Byers (.800 hitting percentage) and Neville (.467 hitting percentage) both had good days, each finishing with eight kills, with Geneva getting kills from nine different players.  Freshman Samantha Peachey (Colorado Springs, Colo./Liberty) led the offense with 20 assists, while junior Kayla Coughlin (Brunswick, Ohio/Brunswick) had a team-high 12 digs.

"We switched up some things with our lineup today, and I thought we received pretty good results with the changes," said Head Coach Wendy Smith.  "We're still trying to figure out what our best rotation is, and we got several good performances tonight from our newcomers, especially Tess, Savannah and Samantha.  With as short of a season this is, combined with a number of talented newcomers on our roster, we're still working hard to figure out how all the pieces fit together, and this was another step in that process."

Geneva heads next to Thiel for a doubleheader on Tuesday starting at 6:00 p.m.


Geneva College is a Christ-centered academic community that provides a comprehensive education to equip students for faithful and fruitful service to God and neighbor. Offering over 145 traditional undergraduate majors and programs, fully online Adult Degree Programs and high-demand graduate degrees, Geneva's programs are recognized for their high quality. Geneva is included on Kiplinger's Personal Finance's "2019 Best College Values" list and has one of the top undergraduate engineering programs in the nation, according to U.S. News and World Report. Adhering to the truth of Scripture, a Geneva education is grounded in God's Word as well as in a core curriculum designed to prepare students vocationally to think, write and communicate well in today's world.