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MIAMI – Kennesaw State fell short in a battle against the No. 2 seed Western Kentucky, as the Owls were on the wrong end of a 3-0 (25–15, 25–16, 28–26) match on Saturday afternoon in the semifinals of the CUSA Tournament. The Owls finish the 2025 season at 19-9, while the Hilltoppers advance to the championship match agianst the host FIU Panthers.
 
STAT OF THE GAME: The Owls finished the match with 19 attack errors and a .222 hitting percentage, while Western Kentucky finished over .400 at 430. The Hilltoppers would commit just six total attack errors in the contest.

THE RUNDOWN – The Owls start the first set on a 2-0 run to get things going, with kills from Olivia Burrage and Haley Patterson. The Hilltoppers would trade points back and forth until they were able to gain control and secure an 11-7 lead and they steadily increased the lead before closing out a 10-point set win (25-15). The second start started mostly the same as the first, as WKU's first attack error of the game did not come until it was 19-12 in the middle set in an eventual 25-16 score. The Owls' play did start to improve as the second set went on, and they carried that over into set three. After WKU started out strong to open up a 15-9 lead, KSU would not back down, scoring eight of the next 10 points to tie the set at 17-17. The Toppers would go back in the lead, and held match point at 24-21. The never say die Owls would not go away easily, holding off an impressive five match points, before WKU finally closed out the match.

POSTGAME QUOTES 
KSU HEAD COACH KEITH SCHUNZEL 
"Heck of a season by our women and program. This was a special group that I will never forget. We had truly terrific leadership from four amazing seniors, who are all fantastic players but better humans. All have impacted so many people in their time, including me and my family, and I'm so dang proud of each one of them. All four will graduate with a degree and go on to do great things, but all four of them will forever be Owls. As a program, this was our 11th straight year in the conference semis or better, a proud and impressive feat. We once again had a wildly successful and impactful Griffins Game raising over $10,000 to support a local family battling childhood cancer. Anyone who says the only thing this is all about is the wins and losses and selling tickets doesn't know what they're talking about, because that game matters. Helping our community matters. And developing, growing, and believing in our young people like we do matters. As a program we once again finished in the top four of a really dang good volleyball league, as well as finished in the top 100 of the country, things that may seem trivial, but are extremely hard to do year in and year out. This year we had 16 women who were so proud to be in this program, who loved each other and stayed connected through all the ups and downs. We had young women who had tough conversations, and who were real with each other. All 16 of them represented themselves with class, competed every day, and showed tremendous respect for each other, this program, our university and our community. I'm so happy and so proud of what and who we are as a program. We're doing this the right way and doing a heck of a lot of winning in the process. I couldn't be prouder to be the head coach of Kennesaw State Volleyball."
 
NOTES

• Olivia Burrage recorded 12 kills and finished with 13 total points.

• Manu Johnsen tallied 10 kills and finished with 10 points. Already the school's all-time career kills leader, she also set the KSU career points mark in Friday's quarterfinal match against Jacksonville State, and has moved both records to 1,584 kills and 1808.5 points.

• Setters Kaeley Walz and Kourtney Brown distributed 21 and 14 assists, respectively.

• Leah Freeman finished with a team-high eight digs.

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