After a record-breaking first match win over South Florida, Illinois State finished a two-win day with a 30-17, 30-27, 30-28 over Southeast Missouri State. Emily Kabbes had 17 kills, Kari Staehlin had 15 and Laura Doornbos 13 to lead the Birds past winless SEMO.
Earlier, Kabbes became only the fourth Illinois State player to hit .800 in a match as Kabbes and her teammates hit an all-time Redbird single-match record .542 for the match on the way to a 30-15, 30-19, 30-21 thumping of South Florida.
Kabbes hit .800 by converting 12 of 15 kills without an error, joining Julie Mueller Paska, Andi Hardwick and her sister, Jenny Kabbes as the only ISU players to hit above .800. The .542 team hitting percentage came on 56 kills in 96 attempts with just four errors. The old record was .536, set by a Paska-led team in 1983 against Illinois.
Doornbos led ISU with 15 kills and Savannah Knowles added 11. South Florida, 2-2, didnt have a block in the match as freshman Kari Staehlin converted 9 of 13 kills for the Birds.
The Redbirds, 5-2, picked up where they left off earlier in the day in game two as Staehlin had eight kills and three blocks in the first game. The Birds hit .350 in that game, but limited SEMO, 0-8, to just .081.
In game two, ISU trailed 21-14 before a Doornbos kill and a Paige White service ace started a 7-1 ISU spurt. But SEMO led 27-25 before a Knowles kill, two more by Doornbos and a Knowles service ace set up game point. Kabbes had nine kills in game three to help ISU withstand three Red Hawk comebacks.
