MURFREESBORO – The sweet feeling of home.

Chowan College’s women’s volleyball team hasn’t had that feeling for nearly two years.

The last time the Braves won a match inside the Helms Center was October of 2003 when they defeated Peace College in a grueling five-set match.

Last year the Lady Braves brought in Becky Roak to turn around a program that has struggled singe moving to four-year status.

In her inaugural season, Roak led Chowan to three wins despite being brought in days before the season opened.

Monday night saw the Braves grab the illusive home victory when they knocked off visiting Roanoke Bible College in four sets.

&uot;I think it was a big confidence boost for us,&uot; Roak said. &uot;We still have some work of course. We were not as crisp as we could have been, but it’s a confidence builder heading into the Wilson College Tournament this weekend.&uot;

The Lady Braves jumped out to an early lead in the first set Monday evening and rolled to an easy 30-14 win.

Sophomore Keyon Sellers opened the match with a winner followed quickly by a Krissy Klijn kill to put the Lady Braves ahead 3-1. The close match continued until Dana Barrett grabbed the serve and collected three straight points including a kill by Shawntanna Proctor that put Chowan ahead 10-7.

Rebecca Mainquist then had five consecutive serves that were not returned, helping the Braves open up a 16-8 lead from which they never looked back.

In the second set, Mainquist started with a service ace and scored five consecutive points on her serve, one of which cam on a Klijn kill.

The Lady Flames battled back to take a 21-20 lead, but the Braves continued their dominance.

Barrett scored two aces followed soon after by a kill from Mainquist and a block by Proctor to help Chowan surge ahead 25-23.

Sellers scored the final three points of the set on her serve, two of which came on Klijn winners to help the Braves secure a 30-25 win in set two.

Roanoke surged to an early 7-2 led thanks to the serve of Bree Hugus and never let the Braves get closer than one point in the third set.

Trailing 22-15, Chowan rallied behind the serve of freshman Kasie Goens, who had three straight points, including two aces to trim the advantage to 22-19.

The braves couldn’t get closer as Roanoke pulled out the victory 30-27.

The fourth set saw the Braves win 30-26 to secure the victory.

Sellers led the way for the Lady Braves with 12 kills and 24 digs on the night while Mainquist had eight service aces and 26 assists. Klijn added 11 kills and seven digs.

Proctor led the freshman attack with nine kills and nine digs.

Chowan (1-2) continued their season yesterday (Wednesday) when they traveled to Greensboro College.