09/15/07

The Saints went the distance in a pair of match victories Saturday afternoon at the Reif Center on campus, defeating Viterbo University 3-2 in a come-from-behind win to open their day then taking a see-saw battle against UW-Stout by the same score to close out their weekend unbeaten in the annual tournament hosted by both UW-Superior and St. Scholastica.

Against Viterbo (11-4), the Saints (3-7) fell behind the V-Hawks 2-0 before winning game three to trim the lead in half. Game four went beyond regulation points with St. Scholastica evening up the match with a 33-31 victory.

In the final game of the match, the Saints built an 11-6 lead before Viterbo rallied to tie the score at 13, but the Saints scored the final two points for a 15-13 win to complete the comeback win.

St. Scholastica (4-7) jumped out early in the Stout (8-4) match with a game one win but fell behind 2-1 to the Blue Devils after the next two games. Once more with the match on the line, the Saints rallied for a game four victory, then led the entire fifth game to win their second match of the day.

Dustie Richardson had one of her best days as a Saint registering 30 kills in the two wins and picking up 11 blocks including eight solo blocks.

Offensive powerhouse Shawna Varichak led the Saints with 36 kills on the day while setter Kati Berscheit had 117 assists.

Defensive specialist Diana Moody had 66 defensive digs for the Saints including 40 in the Stout match, only the third time in her career she has accumulated at least 40 digs in one match.

In other matches on the day, Viterbo defeated The College of St. Catherine’s 3-2, UW-Superior then defeated St. Kate’s 3-2, and Stout defeated Northland College by a 3-1 score. Lakehead University from Canada also attended the tournament and defeated both UWS and Northland by identical 3-1 scores in exhibition matches for the two Wisconsin schools.