MARYVILLE, Mo. – The Ichabods played their first MIAA match on the road Friday at Northwest Missouri and fell behind 1-0 after a quick start from the Bearcats. No. 5 Washburn won the next three sets to defeat Northwest 3-1 (19-25, 25-21, 25-18, 26-24) and improve to 10-0 and 2-0 in the league.
 
Washburn will stay on the road and face Missouri Western Saturday at 1 p.m. in the middle match of a three-game road trip.
 
Marissa Cox finished with 25 kills, two off her career high, and she joined the Washburn 1,000 kill club with her eighth kill of the night. She now has 1,018 career kills and she moved to 18th in school history. She joins her sister, Mandi Cox, as the first sister duo in school history to amass 1,000 kills and she's the first Washburn player in the club since Hillary Hughes and current assistant coach Jessica Fey joined in 2012.
 
Cox hit .383 and also added eight digs and three blocks. Sarah Vicory set a career high with a .632 attack percentage as she had 13 kills with one error in 19 swings. Korie Thompson had seven kills and 10 digs and Taylor Selk had six kills off the bench.
 
Natalie Bates led the offense with 40 assists and she led the defense with 12 digs. Alyssa Carney had 11. Selk, Vicory and Carley Swan all had three blocks.
 
The Ichabods took a 23-21 lead late in the fourth match with a kill from Cox. The Bearcats (4-6, 1-1 MIAA) answered with three straight points with Miranda Foster getting kills on the final two. That gave Northwest Missouri set point at 24-23 but Cox tied the set with a kill. A Bearcat error gave Washburn match point and then Selk's kill ended it.
 
Washburn hit .288 in the match while the Bearcats hit .171 as a team. The Ichabods led in blocks, 9-6 and in kills, 58-52. Foster led Northwest with 18 kills.
 
The Bearcats took a 3-0 lead in the first set and later scored seven of eight straight points to lead 16-8. The Ichabods used a 4-0 run later to get within four but never any closer.
 
Washburn hit above .300 and the Bearcats hit under .120 in both the second and third sets to give Washburn two easy wins.