ELLENSBURG, Wash. – There is no tougher week on the Northwest Nazarene volleyball schedule than the one they just completed.

An eight-hour travel day to Fairbanks, Alaska, last Wednesday, followed by a match Thursday, a flight to Anchorage and another match Saturday. They then departed Anchorage at 1 a.m. for a red-eye flight to Seattle, arriving back on campus at 10:30 a.m.

After a day of classes Monday, the Nighthawks climbed into vans and drove six hours to Ellensburg, Wash., to face Central Washington.

Despite the insane travel, the Nighthawks dug deep and defeated the Wildcats 25-22, 26-24, 9-25, 27-29, 15-11 on Tuesday in a Great Northwest Athletic Conference match.

"They are resilient and gritty. It is something we kept talking about," NNU coach Doug English said. "We didn't practice from Saturday to today, we just traveled basically. I think now the girls know they are good."

To make the win even better, it came after a tough three-set loss to Anchorage on Saturday.

On Tuesday, the Nighthawks (7-7 overall, 3-4 GNAC0 won a pair of close sets to open and after a forgetful third set, appeared ready to wrap up the match in the fourth set. But Central rallied from three match points to grab the 29-27 win and appeared to have all the momentum heading into the fifth set.
Instead, Tayler Markland four kills, Abbey Blum and Brooke Foster had two each and NNU picked up the victory.

"To face the challenges of the loss on Saturday, helped us today," English said. "We lost 25-9 today and were able to come back and play tough in Set 4. Whereas Saturday, we lost 25-7 and didn't come back. They have done a good job of learning and supporting each other."

Markland had a career-high 18 kills and a .316 hitting percentage, while Lexi Ward had five blocks as the two middle blockers played a huge role in the victory.

Blum finished with 11 kills and 10 digs, Foster had 10 kills and 17 digs, Caroline McMahon had 22 digs and Megan Nelson had 41 assists and eight digs.

"We had chances to win Set 4 and didn't pull it out and emotionally that is tough," English said. "They have had a great mindset in five-set matches all year. We had 11 kills and that was better than anything we had done all match and we just played great in the fifth set – we have all year, which is such a big difference from last year."

The Nighthawks moved to 4-1 in five-set matches this season and also surpassed last season's win total.

NNU hosts Montana State Billings at 1 p.m. Saturday.