After a three-year hiatus, the Kaunas-VDU women’s volleyball team regained its title as the strongest team in the Baltics. On Sunday, the Kaunas team triumphed in the Elme Messer Baltic Championship Final Four tournament held in Estonia.
In the final, the Lithuanian team defeated Tartu TU-Bigbank (Estonia) 3:1 (31:29, 22:25, 25:14, 25:23).
The match began dramatically. In the first set, the Estonians led 20:13 and 22:16, but the Kaunas team did not give up and evened the score at 23:23. Later, the Estonian club failed to take advantage of opportunities to win the set, and in the end, the Kaunas team managed to do so – Martyna Paukštytė’s point decided the first set 31:29.
In the second set, the Tartu team quickly pulled ahead again, but this time the Kaunas team was unable to catch up with their opponents, and the overall score was tied.
The Kaunas-VDU volleyball players began to demonstrate their true potential in the third set – they immediately took the lead with a double-digit advantage of 17:7 and did not relinquish the initiative until the end of the set.
Maintaining their positive momentum, the Kaunas team controlled the game in the fourth set. Their opponents closed the gap slightly, but after a couple of successful attacks, Kaunas-VDU led 24:19 and was one point away from victory. However, the Kaunas team was unable to close out the match – the Tartu team scored four points in a row and reduced the deficit to a minimum (24:23). However, the Estonian team’s serve was inaccurate and the Kaunas-VDU volleyball players celebrated their victory.
Viltė Bogdanovič’s Kaunas team scored 12 points by Vakarė Bartkutė, 11 each by Vilūnė Rauluševičiūtė, Eglė Makauskaitė, and Vaiva Valionytė, 9 by Roberta Gabulaitė, 7 by Martyna Paukštytė, 5 points by Ezgi Ozkan Nurperi, 4 points by Neringa Kačinaitė, and 3 points by Miglė Šidlauskaitė.
Nora Lember was the most productive player on the Tartu team (22 points).
Ezgi Ozkan Nurperi, a Turkish player on the Kaunas club, was named the most valuable player of the final four.
Three other Kaunas players – Rusnė Rutkauskaitė, Roberta Gabulaitė, and Martyna Paukštytė – were selected for the best seven players.
Kaunas-VDU had previously triumphed in the Baltic Women’s League in 2017, 2022, and 2023.




