SIU volleyball defeated a Southeastern Conference school for the first time since 2011 for its only win of the weekend.

The Salukis (2-5) played at the Sports Imports D.C. Koehl Classic this weekend. They played Florida Gulf Coast University (2-4) and Auburn University (3-3) on Friday and Ohio State University (4-2) of Sunday.

SIU split the first two sets with FGCU and took a 2-1 lead with a 25-12 win in the third set. The Eagles bounced back and won the next two sets to defeat the Dawgs.

“The issue with them [FGCU] is they force you to kill it in order to gain the point,” coach Justin Ingram said. “They defend so well.”

Sophomore setter Hannah Kaminsky led the team with 26 assists, and sophomore hitter and setter Meg Viggars led with 14 kills. Viggars was second with 16 assists.

Ingram said Viggars’s stats depend on where she is on the court. He said she normally starts either front left or back left, depending if they want her at setter or hitter.

“I just love playing volleyball,” Viggars said. “As long as I’m on the court I don’t really care what position I play.”

The Salukis bounced back against Auburn by sweeping the Tigers 3-0. Auburn beat Florida Gulf Coast 3-1 on Sunday.

“Our intentions during the match were higher,” Ingram said. “We communicated better. The whole feel was more to where our expectation is.”

Kaminsky had three kills on three attempts and no errors. She once again led the team with 16 assists.

“Even though at one point during the match we were up by 7 points,” Kaminsky said. “You wouldn’t be able to tell that we were beating them by so much because their energy was high the whole entire time.”

SIU won the first set 25-22 against Ohio State, but lost the next three to lose the match.

“We weren’t able to recover through the tough parts of the match,” Ingram said. “That was shown in sets two and three. Our offense shut down and our defense was non-existent.”

Kaminsky had 21 assists and Viggars had 11 kills to lead the team.

Ingram said the team has to lower opponent’s hitting percentages moving forward to win more matches.

The team hosts the Saluki Invitational, which starts with Marshall University vs. Kansas State University at 11 a.m. Friday in the SIU Arena. The Salukis first match is against IPFW University at 1 p.m. Friday in the SIU Arena.

Aaron Graff can be contacted at [email protected], on Twitter @Aarongraff_DE or (815)-483-3781