INDIANOLA, Iowa – The College of Saint Benedict volleyball team started its weekend at the Simpson Invitational Friday with a 3-1 win against WIAC rival UW-River Falls.
That win not only marked the team's 14
th of the season, it pushed CSB's winning streak to 11 matches and it matched the team's best start since 2013. That year, CSB started the year 14-1 en route to a 27-4 overall record and an appearance in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.
The team's 11-match win streak is also the best since 2013, when it went 11-0 to start the year before picking up its first loss. The team's longest win streak since that time is an eight-match winning streak last season.
River Falls (11-8) kept things interesting, and took early leads on Saint Benedict in three of the four sets. But, as has been the case lately, the Bennies found a way to win, and came away with the victory with set scores of 25-17, 24-26, 25-16 and 25-19.
The Falcons led 8-4 in set one, but
Gabby Heying,
Madison Weiss and
Hunter Weiss all had kills to help flip the score and build a 14-10 lead for CSB, and the team held on from there. After going down 8-3 to start the second set, Saint Benedict fought back to tie the set at 16-16 on a kill from
Katie Koch, and then took a 23-21 lead after a kill from Hunter and a service ace from
Mary Wenisch, but the Falcons were able to take advantage of a CSB attack error and a kill to hold on for the win.
CSB took an early lead in the third set and then held on for the win, and in the fourth set the Falcons led 4-1 before Saint Benedict went on a 7-0 run to take an 8-4 lead. UWRF later re-gained the lead, but another service ace from Wenisch and blocks from the Weiss twins and Hunter and
Emily Marso helped CSB take the laed back for good.
Hunter Weiss finished with a match-high 17 kills to lead CSB and she also had seven block assists. Heying added 13 kills and
Madison Weiss had 11 kills and five block assists. Koch had 43 assists and 14 digs, Wenisch had a team-high 19 digs,
Bridget McDonald finished with 16 digs and
Haley LaValle had 13 digs.
CSB is back in action Saturday with matches against host-school Simpson at 11 a.m. and Principia at 1 p.m.
