THE SCHEDULE:
Thursday, Oct. 11          Alaska Anchorage at Seattle Pacific, 7:00 p.m.
                                        Brougham Pavilion (2,650) / Seattle, Wash.
                                        Live stats        Live Webcast
 
Saturday, Oct. 13           Alaska Fairbanks at Seattle Pacific, 3:00 p.m.
                                        Brougham Pavilion (2,650) / Seattle, Wash.
                                        Live stats        Live Webcast
 
                      
        Weekly release, with complete updated stats (PDF)
 
SEATTLE – It's no stretch to say that the Seattle Pacific Falcons are sweeping into this week's volleyball matches in Brougham Pavilion.
                          
On the heels of back-to-back three-game victories last week, including a dramatic one at Western Oregon on Thursday, SPU is home for its next three Great Northwest Athletic Conference contests. The first of those is Thursday at 7 p.m. when Alaska Anchorage comes to town. The Seawolves will be followed by Alaska Fairbanks, which visits on Saturday afternoon at 3.
 
The Falcons come into the week riding a season-high three-match winning streak. That started in their last home match when they pulled out a five-game victory against Northwest Nazarene on Sept. 29, and continued on the road at WOU and at Saint Martin's.
 
This will be the longest home stretch of the season for Seattle Pacific. The Falcons split their first two home contests of the year, both of which extended to five games.
 
FOLLOW IT LIVE
Both of this week's matches will have a free live Webcast from both of this week's matches on Stretch Internet, the new Webcast home for the GNAC. Scott Breitbach and former SPU star Jessica Bettencourt will call the action. Live stats also will be available from both matches. The appropriate links can be found at the top of this story.
 
WEEKLY AWARD FOR SWANSON
Shelby Swanson, who posted a double-double of 36 assists and 18 digs in a three-game sweep at Western Oregon last Thursday – her third double-double in as many matches – has been named this week's GNAC volleyball Defensive Player of the Week.
 
Swanson's performance helped the Falcons to a 25-18, 26-24, 25-22 victory against the Wolves. On Saturday, she had 31 assists, another five digs, and a block assist as SPU swept Saint Martin's at Lacey, 25-19, 25-18, 25-14.
 
This is the third time Swanson has been chosen Player of the Week during her career. It is SPU's first such honor this season for volleyball.
 




SO WHAT'S THE STORY THIS WEEK?
-- These two matches wrap up the first half of GNAC play.
-- The Falcons have a chance to extend their current win streak to five if they prevail both matches. Their longest string of victories last year was six; they also had a pair of four-match win streaks.
-- Alaska Anchorage is one of the three teams picked in what essentially was a dead heat for the role of GNAC favorite in the preseason coaches poll, along with Western Washington and Western Oregon. WWU received 72 points in the voting, WOU 71 and Anchorage 70.
-- Coach Chris Johnson, in his eighth year in charge of the Falcons, is 8-6 all-time against Alaska Anchorage. He is 3-5 against Seawolves coach Chris Green, who took charge of that program in 2008. Johnson and Green have split their matches every year except 2009, when UAA won both on the way to capturing the GNAC title.
-- Johnson is 12-2 all-time against Fairbanks and coach Phil Shoemaker. The Nanooks won both matches in 2008, but all the others have gone to the Falcons.
-- SPU will be seeking to top the .200 hitting mark for the fourth match in a row when it takes the court on Thursday against Anchorage.
 
SPEAKING OF THE FALCONS
Ask anyone on the SPU roster, and the response is likely to be similar: This team is now on the path it wants to be on.
                                       
“We're definitely going the right direction. I'm feeling good about the team right now,” head coach Chris Johnson said after last Saturday's victory at Saint Martin's. “We've just had continued good, steady play – just solid hitting, and we passed pretty well (against the Saints).
 
“We're starting to serve a lot tougher too,” Johnson said. “Kendall Langdon has been a big addition (to that). And it helps when your top outside hitter (Cailin Fellows) hits. 300 for two matches in a row.”

Added junior middle blocker Nikki Lowell, “I feel like it started the week before when we played NNU and Central – that's when we finally clicked as a team and came together and were able to make things happen that we weren't able to do before. That kind of carried over into last weekend. We knew what we had to do.”
 
SCOUTING THE ALASKA ANCHORAGE SEAWOLVES: 10-5, 5-2 GNAC (3^rd)
All-time series: SPU leads, 27-14. Current series streak: SPU won 1. Last time: SPU 3, UAA 1 (18-25, 25-21, 25-17, 25-23; Oct. 29, 2011 at Seattle). Seawolves on the Web.
Seawolves in a nutshell: After a slow start in which they lost three of their first four matches in a preseason tournament, Anchorage has been rolling. The Seawolves put together a six-match win streak, including five-game victories in their first two GNAC matches (at Central Washington and at Northwest Nazarene). Their only two GNAC losses have been to fellow co-favorites Western Oregon and Western Washington. Junior middle blocker Jodi Huddleston hits .314, ranking No. 6 in the conference. A pair of freshmen – Katelynn Zanders and Julie Mackey – rank No. 3 and 8, respectively, in kills per game at 3.60 and 3.13. Yet another freshman, Sarah Johnson, is No. 11 in kills at 2.87. Senior setter Kimya Jafroudi leads the GNAC in service aces with 26.
 
SCOUTING THE ALASKA FAIRBANKS NANOOKS: 3-10, 1-6 GNAC (9^th)
All-time series: SPU leads, 30-9. Current series streak: SPU won 6. Last time: SPU 3, UAF 0 (25-10, 25-13, 25-15; Oct. 27, 2011 at Seattle). Nanooks on the Web.
Nanooks in a nutshell: Alaska Fairbanks, an extremely young team with six true freshmen and two redshirt freshmen on the roster, broke into the conference win column last weekend with a four-game triumph at home against Simon Fraser. The Nanooks opened the season with two straight victories, but then dropped 10 straight. Freshman outside hitter Sam Harthun is No. 10 in the GNAC for kills per game at 2.96. Another freshman, setter Katlyn Matava, helps set her up by averaging 9.71 assists per game, fifth-best among conference players. Senior libero Allison Oddy ranks No. 8 in the GNAC for digs per game at 4.12.
 
 
HOW DO THEY COMPARE?
(2012 GNAC ranking)
                                              SPU                UAA               UAF
Hitting pct.                         .192 (6)            .219 (4)        .154 (8)
Opponent's hitting pct.    .207 (T9)          .151 (2)         .207 (T9)
Kills per game                   12.5 (5)            13.2 (2)         11.7 (8)
Assists per game              11.7 (4)            12.3 (2)         11.2 (7)
Aces per game                    1.1 (9)              1.5 (4)           1.2 (8)
Digs per game                   16.3 (3)             16.9 (1)          13.7 (9)
Blocks per game                 1.6 (8)              1.7 (7)            1.4 (10)
 
FALCONS REPLAY
-- Cailin Fellows slammed 18 kills, Shelby Swanson put up her third straight double-double, and SPU, sparked by a phenomenal comeback in that second game with Kendall Langdon serving the final five points, swept Western Oregon in Monmouth last Thursday, 25-18, 26-24, 25-22.
-- Fellows had 12 kills, and Jackie Arnold hit a career-high .800 last Saturday, helping the Falcons to a three-game sweep of Saint Martin's in Lacey, 25-19, 25-18, 25-14.
                      
DOUBLE-DOUBLE DELIGHTS
Senior setter Shelby Swanson made it a double-double three-peat last Thursday at Western Oregon. Swanson (Kennewick, Wash. / Kamiakin HS) came up with 36 assists and 18 digs for her third straight double-double and seventh of the season. She now has 24 for her career.
 
Senior outside hitter Cailin Fellows (Edmonds, Wash. / Edmonds-Woodway HS) double-doubled in both of SPU's home matches during the final week of September, boosting her career total to four. The first two came in 2011, her first season as a Falcon.
 
SPU has 10 double-doubles for the season. In addition to Swanson's seven and Fellows' two, sophomore middle blocker / opposite Madi Cavell (Keizer, Ore.) has her first.
 
FOR SHE'S A JOLLY GOOD FELLOWS
It wasn't just a standout match, for Cailin Fellows – it was a standout week. Fellows hammered 30 kills, an average of five per game, had back-to-back .300 hitting nights (.302 at Western Oregon, .300 at Saint Martin's, came up with 16 digs, had a career-high three service aces at Saint Martin's, and put her 800^th career point into the book. She is now into the top 25 in NCAA Division II for kills per game at 3.91, putting her 22^nd on the list.
 
A BETTER WAY TO START
Factoring into the big steps forward they've taken during the past couple of weeks, the Falcons now have won three consecutive Game 1s, and have gone on to win all three of those matches – at home against Northwest Nazarene (five games) and last week's road sweeps at Western Oregon and Saint Martin's
 
SPU came up short in the opening game in the first five matches of the season, although two of those five matches still went into the win column. The first Game 1 win turned out not to be enough, as Chico State rallied to beat the Falcons in five on Sept. 7 at the Seawolf Spike in California. The first opening-game victory that also ended up as an overall 'W' for Seattle Pacific was in the GNAC opener at Simon Fraser on Sept. 15.
 
HIT 'EM WHERE THEY AIN'T
That string of .200-plus hitting matches that SPU has put together isn't just the result of a couple high-percentage games here and there. Rather, it has been a matter of consistency. Of the last 11 games, (five against Northwest Nazarene, three each against Western Oregon and Saint Martin's), the Falcons have topped .300 hitting in five of them. They have been at .200 or above in nine straight games (the last three vs. NNU, and all six last week) and 10 of their last 11.
 
Of particular note is the second game at Western Oregon last week. Seattle Pacific hit .209 in that game – not particularly special until considering this: Down 13-4 when coach Chris Johnson called a timeout, the Falcons were hitting minus-.231 at that juncture (2 kills-5 errors-13 attacks). In storming back to win it, 26-24, they hit .400 (15 kills-3 errors-30 attacks).
 
And in those aforementioned three straight Game 1 victories, SPU came fast out of the blocks and hit .377, .333 and .316.
 
IT'S AN ACE … AND ANOTHER, AND ANOTHER