ST. PAUL, Minn. - Concordia-St. Paul senior
Anna Schlaak tied for the team lead in kills (7) and digs (11) on an evening in which she became the program's 14th player to reach 1,000 career digs which also made her the fifth player to reach 1,000 kills and digs in a career in team history. The result was a resounding 3-0 victory for the top-ranked Golden Bears (25-2, 17-2 NSIC) over Minnesota Crookston (10-17, 6-13 NSIC) on Friday night at Gangelhoff Center.
Concordia, who won the match by scores of 25-6, 25-12 and 25-18 is now a win away from clinching a share of the NSIC regular season championship. The Golden Bears are tied for first in the standings with Southwest Minnesota State, who defeated the University of Mary this evening.
Concordia will host Bemidji State (7-21, 3-16 NSIC) tomorrow at 4 p.m. at Gangelhoff Center for senior day and has clinched an NSIC Tournament quarterfinal home match, with seeding and pairings to be announced tomorrow evening following the conclusion of NSIC regular season play.
Five players had either seven or six kills for Concordia. Junior
Shelby Seurer and senior
Riley Hanson matched Shlaak's seven kills, with Hanson terminating kills on her first six swings, finishing the night hitting .545 on 11 attempts.
Concordia hit .390 for the evening following a blistering .588 (10-0-17) first set behind senior setter
Kasey Williams, who dished out 27 assists.
The defense was strong, as senior libero
Emily McDonough matched Schlaak's 11 digs in holding UMC to .000 hitting (23-23-91) for the night including the decisive first set which saw CSP hold UMC to -.200 (5-10-25) hitting.
At the net, Concordia was disruptive throughout, producing eight team blocks led by Seurer's five.
The Golden Bears set the tone from the start, jumping out to a 5-0 lead on Seurer's serve. The run included a block, a kill and an ace from Seurer. Following a UMC point, Concordia rallied for six in a row again for a commanding 12-1 lead on McDonough's serve. Concordia opened up an 18-4 lead on a Hanson ace and ended the set with a 7-0 run.
UMC grabbed its first lead of the night right away in the second set, scoring the first two points. Following a 3-1 start to the set for UMC, Concordia scored three in a row and after a 4-4 tie, a three-point run put Concordia ahead for good in the set, opening up a lead of 18-11 and finishing off the set with six consecutive with
Anna Pioske delivering a pair of aces during the spurt.
The third set was the tightest, featuring four ties and two lead changes but UMC's two leads in the set were once again early, at 2-1 and 4-3. After UMC trimmed the third set margin back to 9-8, Concordia pulled ahead 16-10 and held off the visiting Golden Eagles in a match that lasted just over an hour (1:02).
UMC was led by Maggie Perrel's six kills while Sierra Trost had a double-double with 19 assists and 11 digs.
