BILLINGS, Mont. – When it mattered most, the Seattle Pacific Falcons had the last word on the volleyball court Saturday afternoon.
 
And that last word came through loud and clear from Maddie Batiste.
 
SPU scored the fianl four points of the match, and Batiste had kills on three of those four to help polish off a 3-0 Great Northwest Athletic Conference sweep of the Yellowjackets inside Alterowitz Gymnasium.
 
Scores were 25-21, 26-24, 25-20.
 
Senior outside hitter Batiste slammed 14 kills and hit a season-high .385 (14 kills-4 errors-26 attacks). It was her second straight match in the .300s and her third of the season.
 
But Batiste wasn't the only one with a big-numbers kind of day as the Falcons (9-5, 5-2 GNAC) won their third straight match and posted their fifth sweep of the fall.
 
 

Fellow senior outside Erin Gould slammed 15 kills to tie her career high and hit an eye-popping .636 (15-1-22).
 
Sophomore middle blocker Hannah Hair hit .417 (6-1-12) and got her hands on four blocks.
 
SPU hit a season-best as a team, finishing at .381 (51-14-97). That came on the heels of a .347 performance in last Saturday's homecourt sweep against Western Oregon
 
"We kept talking about how confidence comes from preparation, and we did really well preparing," head coach Abbie Wright said. "You control what you can control. We did a great job of depending on the things we worked on, and going back to what was happening in the game and not playing off of emotion. We're just trying to gain confidence, and today was really good."
 
Seattle Pacific took command of a back-and-forth first set with a 5-1 run, extending a 16-15 lead to 21-16. Montana State Billings (7-9, 3-4 GNAC) never got closer than three after that.
 
The Falcons seemed poised to run away with Set 2, bolting to a 12-4 lead. Not only did the Jackets storm back with seven straight points to get within 12-11, they eventually went up by three points on three different occasions, the last time at 22-19.
 
SPU climbed back into ties at 22-22 and 23-23, then gained a set point at 24-23 on a kill by Gould. Billings saved that one, but a kill by Hair provided another set point at 25-24. That one went in the Falcons' favor when an MSUB attack bounced off the antenna.
 
 

MSUB took a 12-8 lead in Set 3. This time, it was Seattle Pacific's turn to bounce back, and it did so with a 7-1 scoring run to go up 15-13. Junior libero / defensive specialist Paige Dawson was on the serve for four of those points.
 
"Paige did a good job getting us back into the match with her serving," Wright said. "She did a good job of anchoring the back row and brought a spark that really helped us out."
 
The Falcons never trailed again, but were never comfortably ahead, either. Back-to-back kills by Gould turned a 17-17 tie into a 19-17 lead. Billings got within one at 19-18, 20-19, and 21-20.
 
But that was it. From there, it was kill by Batiste, a service ace by freshman libero Abigail Cunningham, then two final kills by Batiste, the last of which ricocheted out off the hands of a Billings blocker.
 
BY THE NUMBERS
-- On the way to its final mark of .381, SPU hit .406 in the first set, .379 in the second, and .361 in the third. The 14 errors was its second-lowest total of the season. The only better match was 13 in a three-set sweep of Hawaii Pacific on Sept. 11.
-- The Falcons finished with 11 more kills, 51-40.
-- This was Seattle Pacific's first true road victory of the season. Its other win outside of Brougham Pavilion was a four-setter against Midwestern State at the Oredigger Classic in Colorado on Sept. 4.
-- Erin Gould's 15 kills pushed her past 300 for her career. She now has 305.
-- Gould's previous 15-kill match came in a four-set victory at home against Northwest Nazarene on Sept. 16.
 
UP NEXT
The Falcons concluded a three-match road stretch this coming week with visits to Western Washington on Thursday and Simon Fraser next Saturday. First serve against the Vikings is at 7:00 p.m. The Simon match begins at 4:00 p.m.
 
 
NCAA WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL
Saturday, Oct. 9, 2021
Alterowitz Gymnasium / Billings, Mont.
 
Seattle Pacific 3, Montana State Billings 0
 
Game scores – 25-21, 26-24, 25-20.
 
Service aces – SPU 3 (3 players with 1), MSUB 3 (Fa'ali'I 2).
Kills – SPU 51 (Gould 15, Batiste 14), MSUB 40 (Reed 14).
Assists – SPU 49 (Tulino 23, Lambert 19), MSUB 36 (Hashbarger 32).
Digs – SPU 36 (Gould 7), MSUB 26 (Monck 7).
Block assists / solo – SPU 14 / 2 solo (Hair 3 / 1 solo), MSUB 6 / 2 solo (Hayden 1 / 2 solo).
Hitting (kills-errors-attacks) – SPU 51-14-97—381 (Gould 15-1-22—636), MSUB 40-18-100—220 (Monck 13-5-27—296).
Attendance – 110.
 
 
Records – Seattle Pacific 9-5, 5-2 GNAC.  Montana State Billings 7-9, 3-4 GNAC.
 
 
Next match
Seattle Pacific at Western Washington
Thursday, Oct. 14     7:00 p.m.
Carver Gymnasium / Bellingham, Wash.