GREENEVILLE, Tenn. --- The Tusculum College volleyball team was dealt a 3-0 (25-20, 25-23, 25-19) defeat by the visiting Carson-Newman University Eagles on Tuesday night inside Pioneer Arena. Rachel Garnett led TC (6-7, 4-6 South Atlantic Conference) with nine kills.

Senior setter Hannah Berling registered 23 assists to move into fourth place on Tusculum's all-time career assist list. The Middletown, Ohio native has 2,147 in her four-year Pioneer career. Berling also tallied her team-leading ninth double-double of the season with 10 digs.

Melissa Mazur, who is in her second week as the Division II dig leader, dug-up a match-high 26 balls and tallied the first two kills of her Pioneer career. Sabrina Schleuger found the floor on seven kills while compiling 11 digs. Kaytlin Stroinski added eight digs while Danae Stauffer had four kills. Mariah Lewis made her first career start and tallied a match-high five blocks.

Molly Locke led Carson-Newman (13-2, 9-1) with a match-high 17 kills while Sarah Fairley had a double-double on 12 digs and 10 kills. Anna Patton also registered a double-double with a match-high 40 assists and 15 digs. Taylor Lowe paced the Eagle defense with 21 digs.

The first set was tight early on before Carson-Newman broke a 6-6 tie with six of the next seven points to jump out to a 12-7 lead. The Pioneers cut the deficit to 15-14 on a Garnett kill, but the Eagles responded with a 5-1 spurt to increase their advantage to 20-15.

A kill by Welch and three-straight Eagle attack errors brought TC back within one point of the lead at 20-19. However, Carson-Newman closed out the set on a 4-0 run which included back-to-back kills by Fairley.

TC led for the majority of the second set and used a 3-0 run to take its biggest lead of the match at 18-14. Following an Eagle timeout, Carson-Newman scored the next three to cut the lead to 18-17. The Pioneers re-gained their four-point advantage on a kill by Stauffer that pushed the score to 22-18.

Although the resilient Eagles tallied the next five points to jump back ahead 23-22. A kill by Schleuger evened the frame at 23-23, but Carson-Newman scored the final two points of the set and took a 2-0 match lead.

In the third set, Tusculum raced out to an early 4-1 advantage. However, Carson-Newman reeled off five-straight points as the lead changed hands for the final time in the match. The Eagles used a pair of 4-0 runs in the set to close out the match with a six-point third-set victory.

The Pioneers will step out of SAC play in three matches on the road this weekend. TC will take on Lander and Francis Marion on Friday before going up against USC Aiken on Saturday morning.