Rolla, Mo. – The Missouri S&T Miners put an exclamation point on its seven match home stand defeating Drury 3-1 (25-18, 18-25, 25-22, 25-19) on Tuesday night at the Bullman Multi-Purpose Building. The Miners (13-5, 5-2 GLVC) concluded their homestand with a perfect 7-0 mark and moved into a second place tie with the Panthers (13-3, 5-2 GLVC) in the GLVC West Division.

S&T came out strong to begin the match hitting .314 in the opening set and broke open a tight beginning with a 5-0 run midway through the frame. The Miners got three kills in that run and took advantage of two Drury errors to take a 12-7. After a Panther timeout they went on a 6-2 run to close within 14-13 on a kill from Sarah Kite.

S&T answered by never giving up the lead. It led 19-18 then proceeded to score the final six points of the set to take the opener 25-18. After a kill from Alexis White (Auburn, Wash./Riverside) the Miner defense forced Drury to hit into five straight errors with three of those coming on blocks. Krista Haslag (Linn, Mo./Helias ) and Claire Luther (St. Louis, Mo./Lutheran South) combined for two of those blocks with Luther registering a solo block on Laynie Timmons to end the set.

The S&T defense held the Panthers to .022 hitting percentage in the stanza forcing 13 errors.

The Miners scored the first three points of the second set but Drury countered with an 8-2 run to take the lead. The lead grew to 14-9 when S&T started chipping away with a 5-1 run to get within 15-14. It had a chance to tie the stanza but Dana Shannon (Crystal Lake, Ill./Crystal Lake Central) hit one into the net giving the Panthers a 16-14 edge and the Miners wouldn't get closer than two points the rest of the way as Drury closed the frame scoring 10 of the final 14 points to even the contest.

The Miners committed 11 attack errors in the set while the Panthers had 13 kills against only two errors.

After the intermission, S&T started the third set strong scoring 7 of the first 10 points only to see Drury come back and even it at 7. The two sides then traded the next 10 points before the Miners went on a 7-1 run to take a 19-13 lead. Haslag had a pair of kills in the run while she and Claire Friedlund (Parkville, Mo./Park Hill South) also teamed up for a block.

The Panthers closed to within 22-21 after a block by Brooke Antenen and Chloe Foster but wouldn't get any closer. BJ Specht committed an attack error and then Carlie Combs (O'Fallon, Mo./St. Dominic) made it 24-21 with her eighth kill of the match. After a kill by Foster made it 24-22 it was Combs again coming away with a kill to give S&T the 25-22 set win.

The Miners began the fourth set similar to the third scoring six of the first eight points before allowing Drury to close to within a point. S&T was able to break the frame open with a 7-2 run building a six point cushion. The Panthers cut the deficit to four twice but the Miners wouldn't let them any closer as Gracey Moon (Kirkwood, Mo./Kirkwood) had three of her 13 kills in the final run and teamed up with Luther for back-to-back blocks setting up match point.

S&T finished the contest with an attack percentage of .205 recording 53 kills against 22 errors in 151 attacks. Haslag had a match high 15 kills while Moon added 13. White dished out 47 assists while Jackie Pyles (White Lake, Mich./West Bloomfield) finished with 21 digs.

The Miner defense held the Drury offense to a .104 hitting percentage (49 kills/32 errors/164 total attacks). Timmons led the Panthers with 10 kills while Specht and Foster had eight kills each. Antenen distributed 41 assists and McKenna Poynter dug up 27 attacks.

S&T hits the road this weekend to Kansas City for a pair of conference matches. The Miners take on William Jewell on Friday night at 7 p.m. at the Mabee Center in Liberty, Mo.