Box Score BELLINGHAM, Wash. – For one night, the Vikings showed they aren't quite ready to hand over the title as the top team in the GNAC.
No. 11 Western Washington snapped the Crusaders 12-match win streak and handed the Great Northwest Athletic Conference front-runners their first loss of the league season, beating 19
th-ranked Northwest Nazarene, 25-22, 25-23, 22-25, 25-14, on Saturday night on the WWU campus.
"Western Washington played great and put pressure on us to make plays and be patient and we just weren't quite good enough tonight," NNU head volleyball coach
Doug English said.
The win was the 10
th straight in the head-to-head series for the Vikings (12-4 overall, 5-2 GNAC), who haven't loss to NNU (13-2, 6-1) since a five-set setback on Oct. 8, 2009, in Bellingham.
But this was the first time the two teams met as Top 25 foes, and Saturday night, Western Washington prevailed thanks to the ability to do what the Crusaders have done so well all season – score clutch points to finish off set wins.
After a
Michelle Terpstra kill got NNU as close as 23-22 down in the opening set, the Vikings got a kill each from Kelsey Moore and Rachel Roeder to take an early lead in the match.
The second set was more of the same, as an
Andrea Terpstra kill made it 23-23 before another Roeder kill and one by Kayla Erickson put the host school up two sets to none.
NNU battled back in the third, taking a 22-17 lead on a
Kendra Bodine kill and grabbing the win on an
Elayna Rice kill, but the Vikings used a 10-2 surge in the middle of the fourth set to take control and close out the match.
Rice led the way for the Crusaders with 11 kills and 17 digs in the setback, while Andi Terpstra added 11 kills and five blocks, and Bodine also had 11 kills for NNU.
Michelle Terpstra dished out 37 assists and added 19 digs,
Taylor Roberts had 31 digs and
Kaitlyn Tuholski made 21 digs for the Crusaders, who look to begin a new win streak when they return home to host four straight matches, starting with Seattle Pacific on Thursday night.
