SEATTLE – Heading into the NCAA volleyball tournament for the first time since 2011, the matches are going to get even tougher for the Seattle Pacific Falcons.
 
Getting through their regular-season finale was tough enough on Saturday afternoon.
 
 

Sarah Brachvogel and Erin Smith had 13 kills apiece, Maddie Pruden put another 10 kills on to the court, and No. 19-ranked SPU pulled out a 3-1 victory against highly scrappy Western Oregon.
 
Scores of the Great Northwest Athletic Conference finale in Brougham Pavilion were 28-26, 25-18, 20-25, 25-23.
 
That put the finishing touches on a 22-4 campaign, 16-2 in the GNAC, with Seattle Pacific clinching that title outright on Thursday with a 3-1 win against Saint Martin's.
 
 

"We knew when I watched our team play last year, I thought we had a real talented group," head coach Jason Rhine said. "We had to keep working and getting better at some things, and the team has done that. We've had some great wins, we've had some close wins, and it was great to come out with a lot of them."
 
Now, the Falcons will wait out the rest of the weekend, then gather on Monday afternoon at 4:30 to watch NCAA Selection Show. There's no drama as far as making the eight-team West Regional field – they took care of that on Nov. 11 with a 3-0 sweep at Montana State Billings, securing the GNAC's automatic qualifying berth.
 
All the remains to be seen is which team it will play in their first-round match and where they will play it. The current front-runners to host the tournament are Cal State San Bernardino or Point Loma Nazarene. That final determination will be determined by the regional ranking committee later this weekend.
 
"The team is real excited after two years of kind of being on the edge and knowing they're on the outside looking in and watching the Selection Show," Rhine said. "It's a relief to know that we can watch and just figure out where we're going to be and not if we're going to be in. It's really exciting for the program."
 
 
 
 
 
BACK AND FORTH ALL AFTERNOON
Western Oregon (10-16, 4-14 GNAC) played tough against many of its conference opponents this fall, and certainly did against SPU on Saturday.
 
The Wolves led for much of the first set. Up 16-15, they were called for a double hit, tying the score at 16-16 and giving the serve to Brachvogel. The Falcons put another five straight points on the board, two of them on service aces, to take a 21-16 lead.
 
WOU gradually caught up, finally tying it at 23-23. Then – just as happened in the first last month in Monmouth – Seattle Pacific got three tries at set point, at 24-23, 25-24, and 26-25. Finally, on the fourth try at 27-26, a Wolves attack went wide, giving the Falcons the clinching point.
 
SPU was down 13-9 in Set 2 when it put together another 6-0 run, again with Brachvogel serving for the last five points of it, helping provide a 15-13 lead. The Falcons stayed ahead the rest of the way.
 
Except for a 1-1 tie, Western Oregon led the entirety of the third set, going up 10-5 and never letting the Falcons come closer than four. The Wolves kept it going in the fourth, racing out to a 10-3 advantage and forcing SPU to call a timeout.
 
 

Seattle Pacific was still down 19-15 when Hannah Hair came up with a solo block for sideout and 19-16. Once again, the serve wound up in Brachvogel's hands. Sydney Perry got a kill for 19-17, the Brachvogel had back-to-back aces – the first of which rolled off the net cord and dropped to the floor. Now, it was 19-19.
 
A Western Oregon attack error made it 20-19 – the first lead for the Falcons since the end of Set 2. Brachvogel then came forward and essentially tipped the ball over from behind the line, and SPU was up by two at 21-19.
 
The Wolves tied it twice more at 22-22 and 23-23. Sydney Perry drilled an attack off a WOU defender to set up match point at 24-23. Brachvogel converted it with a crosscourt kill.
 
"Western Oregon did a good job on defense especially," Rhine said. "They just got some extra and found a way to keep some balls alive. They played really hard and made it really tough. There weren't a lot of hitting errors from us. They just played good defense and found some tough digs."
 
CELEBRATING SENIOR DAY
Prior to the first serve, the Falcons honored seniors Sarah Day, Brianna Ingram, Erin Smith, and Maddie Pruden.
 
All four factored into Saturday's win. Along with her 13 kills, Smith had five blocks and hit .290. Pruden finished with 10 kills on .350 hitting. Day added six kills, and Ingram delivered two kills and one block.
 
BY THE NUMBERS
-- SPU hit 271 for the match (59 kills-20 errors-144 attacks). That included .429 in the second set (15-3-28) and .355 in the third (14-3-31).
-- Factored into that percentage was an error-free .556 by Sydney Perry (5-0-9), and .444 by Allison Wilks (5-1-9).
-- Western Oregon was actually even better at .282 (56-16-142). The Wolves hit .324 in the first (17-5-37) and .341 in the third (18-4-41). That's the highest a Falcons opponent has hit all season, the previous high being .243 by Biola on Sept. 2 in just the third match of the year.
 
UP NEXT
The NCAA Selection Show is set for 4:30 p.m. on Monday on ncaa.com.


NCAA WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL
Saturday, Nov. 18, 2023
Brougham Pavilion / Seattle, Wash.
 
(No. 19) Seattle Pacific 3, Western Oregon 1
 
Game scores – 28-26, 25-18, 20-25, 25-23.
 
Service aces – WOU 7 (3 players with 2), SPU 6 (Brachvogel 4).
Kills – WOU 56 (Hornback 15), SPU 59 (Brachvogel 13, Smith 13, Pruden 10).
Assists – WOU 51 (O'Neil 20, Darby 20), SPU 54 (Tulino 29, Veenendall 21).
Digs – WOU 58 (Matlock 17), SPU 62 (Lopez 20).
Block assists / solo – WOU 16 / 2 solo (MacLellan 5 / 1 solo), SPU 8 / 3 solo (Smith 3 / 2 solo, Hair 3 / 1 solo).
Hitting (kills-errors-attacks) – WOU 56-16-142—282 (Strus 10-3-19—368), SPU 59-20-144—271 (Perry 5-0-9—556).
Attendance – 137.
 
 
Records
Seattle Pacific 22-4, 16-2 GNAC.
Western Oregon 10-16, 4-14 GNAC.
 
Next match
Seattle Pacific at NCAA West Regionals
Opponent TBD
Thursday-Saturday, Nov. 3-Dec. 2
Location TBD