NAMPA, Idaho - Cammy Dranginis had 18 kills, but it wasn't quite enough as Western Washington clinched at least a share of its first Great Northwest Athletic Conference volleyball title since 2003 with a 3-1 win (26-30, 30-15, 30-21, 31-29) over Northwest Nazarene Saturday at the Johnson Sports Center in front of 1,248 Homecoming fans on campus for the weekend of activities on the NNU campus.
The win was the 14th straight for the Vikings (19-4, 15-1), who were ranked second in the last NCAA Division II Pacific Regional poll. The match was possibly the toughest during WWU's win streak in which they have lost just four games.
NNU won the first game 30-26 and had a 22-16 lead in the fourth game before Western Washington used a 7-1 run to pull even at 23-23. The Vikings later pulled ahead 29-28 on a kill by Jaime Anderson.
The Crusaders fought off one match point on a kill by Lindsay Forseth, but WWU then got back-to-back kills by Anderson and Emily Castro to wrap up the win.
Castro finished the match with 22 kills, while Anderson and Tiana Roma each had 19. WWU libero Courtney Schneider had a match-high 35 kills, her 21st match with 20 digs or more, tying the GNAC record she set last season.
Schneider, who is looking to become the first NCAA II player to take back-to-back national titles in digs per game, leads the country with a 7.66 average. She also increased her school and GNAC career-record total to 2,472, which ranks sixth all-time in NCAA II.
In addition to Dranginis, NNU was led by Forseth and Chelsea Pelton with 13 and 12 kills, respectively. Loni Evenson led NNU defensively with 24 digs and Pelton had a team-best three blocks.
Dranginis had seven of her kills in the fourth game. "Cammy was phenomenal tonight," NNU coach Jared Sliger. "We somehow found the way to get the ball to her despite some great serving by Western Washington."
Sliger said his team played well - for 2/3 of the match. "We had a good performance. Western Washington is the measuring stick (in the GNAC) and it wasn't a case that they played poorly tonight. I thought they played very well."
The loss dropped NNU, which was ranked fourth in the most recent NCAA Division II Pacific Regional poll, to 16-8 overall and 10-6 in the GNAC. The Crusaders are currently tied for third place in the conference with Central Washington
NNU is 2-2 since the last regional poll and must stay in the top eight to be awarded an at-large berth to the regionals which begin Thursday, Nov. 15. NNU completes its regular-season next week with a pair of road matches at Seattle University and Montana State Billings, respectively.
