 No. 20 Bills Clinch Regular Season Title, Ground Flyers 3-1
Nov. 15, 2008
DAYTON, Ohio - After dropping the opening set at Dayton, No. 20 Saint Louis regrouped and won three straight sets (19-25, 30-28, 25-21, 25-18) to capture their first outright Atlantic 10 Conference West Division regular-season crown on Saturday evening. With the victory, the Billikens also earned the No. 1 seed in next weekend's A-10 Championship at Chaifetz Pavilion in St. Louis. SLU will play at 8 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 22. Sammi McCloud, who led all players with 18 kills and tied for match-high honors with a career-best 20 digs, became the 10th member of SLU's 1,000-dig club and moved up the No. 10 on the program's career kills list with 1,003. Bridget Fonke also posted a double-double (17 kills, 14 digs) for the Bills, while also collecting three blocks. Whitney Roth (54 assists, nine digs) and Megan Boken (nine kills, 12 digs) came close to giving SLU four players with double-doubles. Sally Warning added 13 kills and three blocks, Lauren Christman tied for match-high honors with four blocks and Whitney Behrens contributed 18 digs. Nicole Bateman (16 kills, 16 digs) and Tiffany Gaerke (13 kills, 12 digs) each posted double-doubles for UD, which had no player hit better than .250. Kacie Hausfeld led the Flyers with 45 assists, while Mandy Robbe tied for match-high honors with 20 digs. Saint Louis held a slight lead at the start of the opening set but after a 3-3 tie the Flyers scored four of the next five points to take the lead. The Billikens battled back to knot the score at 10-10 using kills from McCloud and Warning. They eventually gained a 12-11 edge on a Warning kill but UD mounted a 4-0 run to retake the lead for good. A McCloud kill briefly halted the rally but Dayton scored three consecutive points on SLU hitting errors to increase the margin to five points at 18-13. Another McCloud kill and two Flyer hitting errors closed the gap to two points but that was as close at the Bills would get the rest of the way. Bethany Akerhielm helped Dayton close the set on a 4-0 spurt to claim the win. It was the first set the Billikens had dropped since Oct. 11 at Fordham.
Dayton went ahead by two early in the second set on Billiken hitting error and a block. However, the Flyers did not lead by more than two points before Christman's two blocks and a pair of UD offensive miscues allowed Saint Louis to regain the lead at 8-6. Neither team went up by more than two points until SLU broke free for three straight points on a kill from Fonke and two from Boken for a 16-12 edge. Dayton stayed within striking distance and eventually tied the set at 19-19 on a SLU hitting error. A battle ensued as the team tied at every point from 19 to 28. The Flyers had two chances to earn the victory, but it was Saint Louis that came through on the fourth attempt at set point with a solo block from McCloud to knot the match at two sets apiece. After UD led by as many at three points, the Billikens broke an 8-8 deadlock with four straight points to earn a lead they would not relinquish. The Flyers got to within one point of SLU at 15-14 with the help of back-to-back kills from Becky Novacek and Bateman. But that was as close as they would get as SLU out-hit Dayton .343 to .163 in the third set, and committed just two hitting errors. The Bills earned a lead early in the fourth and final set and never looked back en route to their second A-10 regular-season title. Boken, Fonke and Christman contributed kills to a five-point spurt that gave Saint Louis a 10-3 advantage. After SLU's lead ballooned to seven points, the Flyers began to chip away at the margin. They drew as close as 16-14 but kills from Boken and McCloud and a UD hitting error pushed the lead back out to five points. Saint Louis returned its lead to as many as seven points before coming away with the match victory after out-hitting the Flyers .333 to .139 in the final set. |
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