Lancers Win Eighth-Straight With a Sweep

Thursday, October 25

Riverside, Calif.

7:00 PM

California Baptist University

Chicago State

Team	1	2	3	Final F
Chicago State	13	20	23	0
California Baptist	25	25	25	3

Photo by: Emeline Delanis

Lancers Win Eighth-Straight With a Sweep

10/25/2018 9:03:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

By: Andrew Shortall, Asst. Sports Information Director

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – California Baptist University secured its first-ever Western Athletic Conference sweep Thursday night over Chicago State to extend its winning streak to eight matches.

The Lancers out blocked the Cougars 10-6 and took advantage of a number of unforced errors from CSU in the 25-13, 25-20, 25-23 victory. While it was nice to win in three sets, Coach Branden Higa knows every victory is precious in the WAC.

"Wins are good either way, we have been a team at this point that has figured out a way to win, and that's a really great quality," Higa said.

CBU plays its second-to-last home match of the regular season against Kansas City Saturday at 1 p.m. in the Van Dyne Gym. The Lancers will play their Senior Night game against Utah Valley next Thursday at 7 p.m.

Megan Sester put together another great match with a match-high 17 kills, three blocks and three digs. It came just two days after she set a career-high of 21 kills against UC Riverside.

"She's really playing well and playing aggressive," Higa said. "The big thing is she's learning how to deal with situations that aren't perfect and keep the ball in play and not make errors. You've seen her hitting percentages go up because she's making less errors. When she does that, she's really tough to stop."

"It felt good to win in three," Sester said. "It's definitely something we have been working on, being less of a rollercoaster team and staying consistent. It showed tonight, we stayed focused and disciplined the whole match."

Natalie Zimmerer did a good job of mixing up the offense and finished with 36 assists, four digs and two blocks. Five Lancers had at least five kills. Sydney Marks put down nine kills on a .350 percentage (9-2-20) and five blocks, while Summer Avery had seven kills, six digs and four blocks.

Tesa Oaks (eight digs) and Yagoda Jedrzejczak had five kills each, as well, with Jedrzejczak hitting .625 (5-0-8) and adding four digs and two blocks. Nicole Abreu had a match-high 14 digs.

"It starts with serve receive and our passing was pretty good all night," Higa said. "We had stretches where we defended balls well and we went on big runs. That was key tonight and going forward it's about maintaining that and doing that against future opponents."

The Lancers ran away with a 25-13 win in set one, thanks to their .355 hitting percentage (14-3-31) while Chicago State hit .000 (7-7-34). Sester attacked at .714 percentage (5-0-7), while Jedrzejczak (.600, 3-0-5) and Marks (.500, 3-1-4) both hit .500 or better in the first set.

Chicago State managed to force a 16-16 tie in set two, but the Lancers ended the game on a 9-4 run. The Lancers scored four-straight points on kills, with two from Avery and one each from Jedrzejczak and Sester for a 20-17 lead. Two kills from Marks and an ace and kill from Avery gave CBU set point, 24-18, and Sester notched it with another kill.

Things were close late in set three. A kill from Avery and Sester gave CBU a 23-16 lead but Chicago State scored five-straight points to pull within 23-21. A Sester kill made it 24-21, but the Cougars scored two-straight points to make it 24-23. Sester then killed the match point to secure the sweep.