Gainesville, GA -- The Piedmont College volleyball team got a record breaking performance from defensive specialist PAIGE ESLINGER earlier this evening to pull off a come-from-behind 3-1 victory over in-state foe Brenau University.  The Ringgold native posted 42 digs in the match, a NCAA era program record, with the 22nd dig of her night also representing the 1,000th of her three-year Lady Lion volleyball career.

Piedmont dropped the opening set in tonight's match 25-11 digging themselves an early hole with Brenau taking the 1-0 match lead.  However, against one of the best defenses his team has seen all season, Head Coach Sid Feldman's squad would not be denied. 

“Brenau really deserves a ton of credit for the performance they put in tonight especially defensively,” said Feldman of the big road win.  “They were definitely one of the best defensive teams we have matched up against on the year, but we had a great effort by our girls to get a win on the road, something that is always tough to do.”

Feldman's squad responded well to the defeat in tonight's opening set coming out win set two by a tight 25-22 margin.  Exploding in the third set to win 25-16, Piedmont would again need another tight winner in set four 25-23 to clinch the overall 3-1 match victory, their 14th win of the 2011 season. 

The win was a storyline alone for Lady Lions Head Coach Sid Feldman as it was his first victory over one of his former teams as the current leader of Piedmont volleyball spent two years as the Head Volleyball Coach at Brenau in the middle 1990s.  Feldman led his 1997 squad at the Georgia college to one of the program's first ever winning seasons at 17-15 overall.

However, stealing the spotlight on the night was Piedmont's own defensive stalwart Paige Eslinger who entered the night needing 22 digs to reach 1,000 in her career, a feat that becomes only more impressive considering Eslinger took over a consistent starting libero role just last season.  The junior got more than what she needed to reach the career milestone mark picking up 42 on the night, a new single match record for PC volleyball, and her first ever performance of 40-plus digs.

Leading the way in assists was sophomore Katheryn Knarr who collected 24 helpers on the evening.  Junior Hallye Jerkins tabbed nine kills in the win while Katie Byrd had an impressive 11 kills playing in the last three sets of the match.

The victory is the 12th in the last 13 games for PC moving the squad's overall record to 14-2.  Piedmont returns to action on Thursday, September 29th when the Lady Lions again hit the road to face in-state rival Oglethorpe University.  First serve in the battle of Georgia colleges is set for 7:00 pm in Atlanta.