Despite 21 kills and 13 digs by Ally Ford, 43 assists by Lauren Greenspoon and 42 digs by Megan Kaufman, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga volleyball team lost 3-2 in its Southern Conference opener Friday evening against Western Carolina. The set scores were 25-21, 25-22, 21-25, 21-25, 15-9 in favor of the visitors (6-9, 1-1). Also for the Mocs (7-8), Emily Plumlee had 13 kills, Miranda Elpers 11 and Dani Szczepanski and Eden Murray 10 apiece and Maddie Halsey added 16 assists.
-Silvia Sartori had 18 kills and 11 digs, but Lee University lost 3-1 (25-20, 19-25, 28-26, 28-26) at Christian Brothers in Gulf South Conference volleyball Friday. CBU sophomore Emma Lenoir from East Hamilton had 25 kills and nine digs. Also for Lee (6-3, 0-2), Allie Koepfer had 12 kills and 14 digs, Sadie Johnson and Kristi Farley had 30 and 23 assists and MaKayla Beebe had 12 digs and four aces.
-Bryan College and Tennessee Wesleyan won Appalachian Athletic Conference home volleyball matches Friday against teams from Columbia, S.C. Bryan beat Allen University 3-1 (25-16, 25-19, 22-25, 25-18), and TWU defeated the Columbia Koalas 3-1 (25-14, 25-27, 25-20, 25-17). For Wesleyan (5-10, 1-4), Sydney Ritten had 15 kills and Marjorie Smith and Olivia Fisher added 12 each, while Tia Madden and Gabi Catt each had 20 assists and Elizabeth Houk had 15 digs. For Bryan (3-12, 2-3), Anna Owens had 15 kills and six aces and Mariah Dunlop, Emalie Hicks and Brooke Stowell had 11, 10 and nine kills. Veronica Salas and Sidney Pierce contributed 21 and 17 assists and Kristen Parrish had 32 digs.
-A play in Covenant College's volleyball home win Wednesday night against Maryville College became one of the ESPN "SportsCenter" top 10 for Friday morning. A dig by Maryville's Allison Botts on a hit by Covenant's Hannah Harris sailed backward and swished through the basketball hoop at the end of the court. Maryville's Kaitlyn Flickinger amazingly played the ball back over the net, but the play was ruled dead. After making the rounds of social media Wednesday night, it got thousands of Twitter views Thursday, according to a Covenant release, and was picked up by the NCAA Volleyball and Division III accounts and ultimately sent to ESPN.
Golf
-The UTC women's golfers are tied for ninth out of 17 teams after the first day of Furman's Lady Paladin Invitational. The Mocs shot a collective 303, led by Cristina Perez in a tie for 18th place individually at 74 and Maddy McDaniel in a tie for 23rd at 75. Megan Woods shot a 76 and Holly Morgan and Monica San Juan added 78s. Daytona State leads at 284, four shots ahead of Virginia Tech, and Furman and Middle Tennessee State are third and fourth at 293 and 295. MTSU's Jenna Burris from Manchester is tied for 14th at 73.
Soccer
-UTC opened SoCon women's soccer play Friday with a 3-0 loss at East Tennessee State. Eleonora Goldoni assisted on Megan Sours' goal 2:26 into the game and scored the final one for ETSU (3-6, 1-0), which had an 8-3 edge in shots on goal. The Mocs (2-6-2) took 18 shots in all.
-Lee's women and men both lost 1-0 in a GSC soccer doubleheader Friday at Christian Brothers. Lauren Magdefrau scored seven minutes into the second half for the CBU women (6-2, 3-1), dropping the Lady Flames to 4-3, 3-1. Brendan Bennett scored two minutes into the second half in the men's game, leaving Lee 2-3-2, 1-2.
-Samantha Green scored from a Lauren Cunningham assist in the first half and Nicole Broderick scored twice in the second half as Tennessee Wesleyan won 3-1 in Appalachian Athletic Conference women's soccer Friday at Bluefield. The TWU men made it a sweep with a 1-0 victory over the previously 9-0 Rams. Ben Timms scored at 58:22 for the Bulldogs (6-2, 1-1).
-Ferrum beat visiting Covenant 2-1 with a goal seven minutes into overtime in a USA South men's match. Jesse Riggs gave Covenant (2-6, 0-3) an early lead, and Jonathan Crossman made seven saves.