ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – The Embry-Riddle volleyball team closed out the 2015 season on Saturday afternoon with a 3-0 defeat at the hands of the Eckerd Tritons. The Blue and Gold fell by scores of 25-14, 25-21, and 26-24 to finish the year at 12-18, while Eckerd ends the regular season at 17-13.
 
Tamires Ferreira led all players with 14 kills and added 17 assists and eight digs as the Eagles ran a 6-2 offense for just the second time this season. Jordan Nakayama collected 18 assists to lead the team and picked up six digs. Evelina Abdurakhmanova had 12 kills and nine digs while Sumerr Paxton picked up a match-high 23 digs.
 
The Tritons came out in the first set with an offense that was nearly impossible to stop. Eckerd had 20 kills and just one attack errors on 34 attempts, good for a .559 hitting percentage that propelled the home side to a 25-14 set win.
 
The Eagles scored the first three points of set two but EC quickly bounced back, taking an 8-5 lead over the next 10 points. The Blue and Gold cut the deficit to a single point on three separate occasions but the Tritons had an answer every time as they earned a 25-21 win to take a 2-0 lead in the match.
 
Set three started identically to set two, with ERAU jumping out to a 3-0 lead. The Eagles led by as many as four points multiple times during the set, maintaining the advantage until the final few points. Back-to-back ERAU errors tied the set at 22, but an Abdurakhmanova kill and a block from Erika Hinel gave the Eagles set point at 24-22. Eckerd rallied from that point, scoring four straight points to win the set, 26-24.
 
The match was the final time that seniors Sumerr Paxton, Erika Hinel, Tamires Ferreira and Evelina Abdurakhmanova took the court for Embry-Riddle. For Paxton and Hinel, the duo finish their careers with 84 wins, three Sun Conference regular season and tournament championships and two trips to the NAIA National Championship Final Site. Ferreira finishes her career with 55 wins in her three seasons and ranks third in ERAU history in assists. Abdurakhmanova was a part of 33 Eagle wins and, despite only having two seasons as an Eagle, ranks 10th in program history in kills and third in kills per set.