THE SCHEDULE
Saturday, Sept. 21               Seattle Pacific at Montana State Billings, Noon PDT
                                                Alterowitz Gymnasium / Billings, Mont.
                                                Live Webcast        Live stats
 
 
SEATTLE – Their rugged preseason schedule is in the book. Now that they're heading into the Great Northwest Athletic Conference portion of the volleyball calendar, it's going to be just as rugged for the Seattle Pacific Falcons.
 
SPU begins conference play with a single match this week, visiting Montana State Billings on Saturday. First serve in Alterowitz Gymnasium is at noon Pacific time. It will be their only  match this week, as the Falcons and Yellowjackets are "travel partners." In the GNAC, when travel partners are scheduled to play each other, it is their only conference contest that particular week.

The Falcons (0-8) head into Montana seeking their first victory of the year.
 
The 18 GNAC contests will be spread over the next 10 weeks of the regular season.
 
FOLLOW IT LIVE
Free live Webcasts and live stats will be available from all GNAC matches. All Webcasts will be on YouTube. The appropriate links can be found at the top of this story.
 




SO WHAT'S THE STORY THIS WEEK?
-- The Falcons have an all-time 10-12 record in GNAC openers.
-- That includes last year's  3-0 win at Western Oregon. In fact, the first three GNAC matches ended in 3-0 sweeps.
-- SPU scored sweeps in both 2023 matches against Billings.
-- This will be just the second true road match of the year. The only other one was in the season opener at Cal State San Bernardino on Sept. 5. The other seven in preseason play were considered neutral court.
-- The Falcons have won both matches against MSUB for the past three seasons.
-- SPU set a team record for service aces in Alterowitz Gymnasium on Nov. 5, 2022 when it sent 19 over the net.
 

-- Sophomore libero Christina Lopez missed the first four matches with an injury, but was back in a big way last weekend. In the opener against Lewis, she immediately set a career high with 24 digs. By the end of the weekend, she had 62 through four matches and moved past 300 for her career (now 337).
 

-- Speaking of career highs, fifth-year middle blocker Allison Wilks had two last Saturday against Missouri-St. Louis with 15 kills (previous high 10, three times) and 23 attacks (previous high 22).
-- With eight of the season's 26 matches complete, the Falcons still have six players who have been on the court for all 31 sets: Abigail Cunningham, Allison Wilks, Hannah Hair, Emily Tulino, Erin Smith, and Sydney Perry.
-- If they keep it up, Wilks and Tulino will have a chance to play in every set for a third consecutive season.
-- With 40 total blocks, Hair has matched exactly the number she had through eight matches last year, when she finished with 160.
-- The Falcons certainly have been spreading the offense around, as Sydney Perry leads with 62 kills, and four players have 50-plus: 54 for Wilks and Erin Smith, 51 for Hair, and 50 for Coco Barnett.
-- Senior defensive specialist Cunningham can be the first Falcon this season to reach 100 digs. She comes in with 98. She is tied for No. 7 in the GNAC at 3.13 per set.
-- Of the GNAC's top five hitters through preseason play, two of them are wearing maroon. Hair is No. 3 with her .310 percentage, and Wilks is No. 5 at .289.
-- Those two also are at either end of the top 10 in blocking: Hair in the No. 1 spot at 1.29 per set, and Wilks is No. 10 at 0.87.
-- Coach Jason Rhine is 4-0 all-time against Billings.
 
SCOUTING THE MONTANA STATE BILLINGS YELLOWJACKETS: 5-3, 0-0 GNAC.
All-time series: SPU leads, 37-13.  Current series streak: SPU won 6.  Last time: SPU 3, MSUB 0 (25-17, 25-16, 25-22; Nov. 11, 2023 at Billings).  Last MSUB series win: MSUB 3, SPU 1, (25-22, 25-23, 21-25, 25-19; Nov. 14, 2019 at Seattle).  Yellowjackets on the Web.
Yellowjackets in a nutshell: Billings, which won three matches all last year, already has exceeded that total with five preseason victories. The offense runs primarily through 5-foot-9 grad student outside hitter Jahsita Fa'ali'I, who has 104 kills, an average of 3.71 per set, and sophomore 5-10 outside Jordin Taulua, who is right behind with 101 (3.61). Their averages are Nos. 2 and 3 in the GNAC, respectively. Fa'ali'I has been in double-digit kills all eight matches, including a career-high 20 at Black Hills State on Sept. 12 when she hit .327. She also is tied for the team lead in service aces with 14. Senior defensive specialist / libero Christine Funk has that many, as well. Taulua is coming off a career-high 21-kill outing on Sept. 14 against Minnesota-Crookston, one of her five double-digit days.  An effective two-way threat is sophomore 6-1 middle blocker Julia Gordon. She has 70 kills, hits a team-high .276, and leads the way in blocks with 24 (7 solo). At 12.57 kills per set, Billings is significantly better than a year ago when it averaged just 9.6.

GNAC FORECAST: TIGHT AT THE TOP
Seattle Pacific has been picked for a second-place finish in the GNAC preseason coaches poll that was announced on Aug. 21.
 
But essentially, it's a dead heat with Central Washington for the No. 1 spot. The Wildcats received 91 points in the voting from the conference's 10 coaches, with two first-place votes. The Falcons received 90 points and picked up six first-place votes.
 
Behind those two, perennial power Western Washington was third with 75 points. Just one point behind the Vikings is Simon Fraser. The Red Leafs got the other two first-place votes.
 
Fifth-year middle blocker Hannah Hair was chosen as the GNAC Preseason Player of the Year in voting by conference coaches. Allison Wilks, also a fifth-year middle, joined Hair on the preseason team.
 
ABOUT THAT PRESEASON SCHEDULE …
In their eight preseason tournament contests, including four in Denver last week at the Colorado Premier Challenge, Seattle Pacific came up against seven opponents who have been part of either the preseason or the regular-season national top 25. And, of those eight opponents, six played in last year's NCAA Tournament.
 
That docket ranks as the second-toughest in the country on the masseyratings.com Website. The only team above the Falcons in the strength of schedule category is Western Washington. Matter of fact, the top three toughest schedules and four of the top six belong to GNAC schools: Western, SPU and Central Washington are 1-2-3, with Simon Fraser at No. 6.

That said, SPU got at least one set from five of those seven ranked opponents. And, of the 24 sets that those opponents won, five of them went to 25-23, another three went to 25-22, one went to 29-27, and another went to 28-26. In addition, there was the fifth set against Cal State Los Angeles that went to 15-13. In that match, the teams played a total of 215 points, with CSULA winning 108 and SPU 107.
 
SEPTEMBER ROAD WARRIORS
It's not unusual for SPU to play both of its preseason tournaments out of town, as was the case again this year. But it is unusual – though not unheard of – to go the entire month of September without playing at home.
 
That has happened just four times in the previous 38 years of the program, most recently in 1997 when the Falcons played their first 18 away before finally opening at home on Oct. 6.
 
The other three occasions were consecutive years in the early 1990s: the first 18 matches in 1991 (home opener on Oct. 11), the first 14 in 1992 (home opener on Oct. 1) and the first 16 in 1993 (home opener on Oct. 16, the latest ever).
 
This season's home debut will be on Thursday, Oct. 3 against Alaska Fairbanks.

 

A CAREER HIGH – BUT THAT'S NOT ALL
Senior setter Emily Tulino was certainly finding her teammates last Saturday on the final day of the Colorado Premier Challenge.
 
In the first match of the day, she recorded a career-high 39 assists. That beat her previous mark of 38, which she had twice, both during her 2021 freshman season. She kept going in the final match against Central Missouri, racking up 35. That gave her 73 for the day and 102 for the weekend.
 
But that's not all she was doing. Tulino also had two kills in the CMU match and one block assist in each of the two matches.
 
FAMILY AFFAIR
Emily isn't the only Tulino playing volleyball in Seattle this fall. Older sister Sophia is competing across town at the University of Washington.
 
An outside hitter, Sophia is a grad student who played previously at Division I Santa Clara. Last year, she led the Broncos with 261 kills on .233 hitting and was an All-West Coast Conference honorable mention pick.
 
The two Tulinos played together at La Costa Canyon High School in Carlsbad, California, and are sharing a residence this year.
 
MARCH TO A MILESTONE
In the making
200th dig        Zoe Shuckhart (has 191)
300th dig        Sarah Brachvogel (has 293)
500th assist     Sophia Chambers (has 478)
500th kill       Allison Wilks (has 492)
                 Sydney Perry (has 481)
                 Erin Smith (has 474)
600th kill       Sarah Brachvogel (has 564)
1,000th dig      Abigail Cunningham (has 839)
2,000th assist   Emily Tulino (has 1,755)
 
Made last week
300th dig        Christina Lopez (has 337)
500th block      Hannah Hair (has 511)
 
AROUND THE WEST
With preseason play complete, the GNAC has a much different look than many were expecting. Atop the standings is Western Oregon with a 7-1 record. The Wolves started off 7-0 before dropping a five-setter last Saturday at Cal State San Marcos. Alaska Fairbanks has the second-best preseason record at 8-2, then  it's Montana State Billings at 5-3. Central Washington is 2-4, but went five sets with the three top California team last week in Ellensburg. The Wildcats handed Pomona its first loss of the year and barely fell short of San Bernardino and Los Angeles. WOU and Central clash in a GNAC opener on Thursday night.
 
Stanislaus State wound up with the best preseason record in the California Collegiate Athletic Association at 7-1. Cal Poly Pomona was right behind at 6-1, with wins against St. Cloud State and Chaminade, and 3-0 sweeps of Simon Fraser and Western Washington. Cal State L.A. and San Francisco State both went 5-2. Pomona hosts San Bernardino (4-3) on Friday and San Francisco State on Saturday.
 
Point Loma Nazarene has emerged as the only undefeated team in the entire West Region. The Sea Lions are 6-0. But the team to watch out for is Chaminade (7-3). The Silverswords reached the Gold Bracket final – the de facto championship match – of the Colorado Premier Challenge last week and took No. 9 West Texas A&M all the way to a fifth set before falling short. Along the way, they beat No. 2 Wayne State (Nebraska) and No. 3 Metro State. They week before, Chaminade swept Cal State San Bernardino and Cal State L.A. in San Bern.
 
UP NEXT
The Falcons wrap up their road month next week, visiting Northwest Nazarene on Thursday, Sept. 26 and Central Washington on Saturday the 28th. First serve in Nampa is at 6;00 p.m. Pacific time, and the first serve in Ellensburg is at 1:00 p.m.
 
 
 
GNAC STANDINGS 
                                                    GNAC          Overall
Western Oregon           0-0       7-1
Alaska Fairbanks         0-0       8-2
Montana State Billings   0-0       6-3
Alaska Anchorage         0-0       6-4
Simon Fraser             0-0       4-3
Northwest Nazarene       0-0       3-5
Saint Martin's           0-0       2-6
Western Washington       0-0       1-5
Seattle Pacific          0-0       0-8