In compiling a 25-2 record this season, the UAA volleyball team has played small-ball – that is, the Seawolves have relied on a small group of players to get the job done.
For the last month, eight players have carried the load. On Saturday, perhaps the least heralded of that group turned in an exceptional performance to help UAA sweep Western Oregon in Monmouth, Oregon.
Vanessa Hayes, a 5-foot-11 freshman, had a flawless hitting night in the 25-21, 25-19, 26-24 Great Northwest Athletic Conference victory.
She attacked the ball seven times and all seven went down for kills, giving her a perfect hitting percentage.
Hayes had UAA's only solo block and was in on two other blocks. She came up with three digs, which is a bigger deal than it sounds, given that Hayes is a middle blocker who only plays in the front row. And she put up an assist – her sixth of the season.
The timing couldn't have been more perfect for Hayes.
She was coming off a poor match on Friday against Portland's Concordia University – she had five errors and two kills on 17 attack attempts for a minus-.176 hitting percentage – and she was playing practically next door to her hometown of Salem, Oregon.
Hayes got her assist and one of her digs on the same play in the first set to help UAA take a 23-18 lead, evoking cheers from a tiny crowd of 227.
Another freshman also came up big for the Seawolves (25-2 overall, 15-1 GNAC). Diana Fa'amausili ripped a team-high 11 kills to help UAA to its fourth win in a row.
Sophomores Chrisalyn Johnson and Leah Swiss each had nine kills, with Johnson getting a double-double thanks to 11 digs and Swiss coming close with nine digs.
Morgan Hooe had five kills, seven digs and two block assists to go with 36 assists, Erin Braun added four kills and two block assists and Kyla Militante-Amper posted a team-high 18 digs.
Western Oregon (9-14, 6-10) was led by Alisha Bettinson's 16 kills and Christie Colasurdo's 21 digs.
The Seawolves are back home this week for their final GNAC home series of the season. They play Northwest Nazarene on Thursday and Central Washington on Saturday in a pair of matches scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. at the Alaska Airlines Center.
The late starts are due to the Class 4A and Class 3A volleyball tournaments, which are also being played at the arena.
Fans with tickets to the high school tournament will get $5 off entry to the UAA matches, and fans with tickets to the UAA matches will get $5 off entry to the high school tournaments.