The Ball State men's volleyball team started off on the right note this season, winning a pair of road matches over the weekend while only losing one set.
The Cardinals opened the season with a 3-1 victory over Mount Olive, then defeated Barton 3-0 on Saturday in impressive fashion.
"It's nice to be 2-0, especially anytime we head out on the road," head coach Joel Walton said in a statement. "And to come back with two victories, that's a solid weekend performance."
Junior Marcin Niemczewski led the charge against Mount Olive with 13 kills, three digs and one block assist. Senior Matt Walsh also put up big numbers, recording three aces, one solo block, one block assist, eight digs and eight kills on the night.
Defensively, senior David Ryan Vander Meer had 14 digs, while sophomore Brendan Surane had four block assists.
Overall, the sets were competitive, but Ball State proved too much for Mount Olive.
"It's always good to get a road win," Walton said in a statement. "Overall, I think we ran good offense at times ... I'd like to see us do better with our serving game, since we had a few too many errors there."
The Cardinals dropped their lone set of the weekend 21-25 against the Trojans. Walton credited Mount Olive for their serving game that broke Ball State's passing game.
Ball State carried the momentum from their win into their match against Barton.
The Bulldogs proved to be no issue for the Cardinals, who won 3-0. They defeated the Bulldogs 25-10 in set one, then won the next two sets 25-22 and 25-20 to cap off the match.
Matt Sutherland led the Cardinals offensively posting nine kills on 13 attempts along with five digs on the night. Hiago Garchet finished the match with 33 of the team's 35 overall assists on 36 attempts. Garchet matched Sutherland with five digs.
The win over Barton capped off an impressive opening weekend for Ball State.
"We had times of really solid play, along with many defensive blocks," Coach Walton said in a statement. "Our offense ran at a really high efficiency two days in a row."
