GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— All-America middles Kasie Gilfert and Camille Smith combined for 27 kills and eight blocks while hitting a combined .457 to lead the Colorado Mesa University Mavericks to their third Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference volleyball win of the week over former conference co-leading Dixie State University on Saturday afternoon here at Brownson Arena.
 
Gilfert had 15 kills and five blocks while hitting .462 while Smith had 12 kills on .450 hitting and added three blocks in the 25-19, 25-21, 27-25 win, CMU's first home-triumph in three all-time meetings with the Trailblazers, who will be leaving the RMAC for NCAA Division I and the Western Athletic Conference next year.
 
Saturday's victory, which came on the heels of Tuesday and Friday night victories over Western and Westminster, also avenged CMU's only home loss from last season and improved them to 8-5 overall and to 4-1 in the RMAC this year, just a half-match behind MSU Denver, who they play at the Auraria Events Center on Friday a 7 p.m. in a re-match of last year's RMAC Tournament Championship match, which the Mavericks won.  The Roadrunners (9-3 overall) are the only team without a conference loss this year.
 
DSU, which was also knocked out of both the RMAC and NCAA Division II Tournaments by the Mavericks on neutral-courts last season, fell to 8-4 and 3-1 in the RMAC as their 7-match winning streak was snapped while falling out of a first place tie with the Roadrunners.
 
On Saturday, the Mavericks had a 44-38 advantage in total kills and out-hit the Trailblazers .205 to .156.  They also had a 52-41 edge in digs as sophomore libero Kerstin Layman recorded 15 while junior setter Ara Norwood had 11.  Norwood also had 19 assists to tally her third double-double of the year.
 
Samantha Ritter also had 16 assists and seven digs as the Mavs' other setter in the 6-2 attack.
 
Megan Treanor had a 10-kill, 13-assist double-double for the Trailblazers.
 
Although the Mavs, were out-blocked 9-8 by the conference's top blocking team, they were able to record six service aces and committed just two errors behind the service line.  The Trailblazers were guilty of seven and had just three aces.
 
The Mavericks were able to hit .278 as a team in the opening set and used a 3-0 spurt triggered by a Smith kill to open an 18-15 lead en-route to the win.
 
The Mavs would then rattle off seven straight points to turn an 11-8 deficit into a 15-11 lead in the second set.  Ashton Reese and Gilfert started that run with kills before Gilfert combined with Holly Schmidt and Maranda Theleus for back-to-back blocks.
 
The Trailblazers would gradually get back within one at 20-19 but could never get over the hump as three successive hitting errors, one of which was the result of Schmidt and Gilfert block put the Mavs up 24-19.

Schmidt then finished the set off.
 
The third set was a barn-burner and was tied on 22 separate occasions.  It also had 11 lead changes.
 
The Mavs went up 24-23 on a Smith kill to earn their first match point before a Sai Collins kill for the Trailblazers, upheld on a video replay challenge, tied the set at 24.  The Trailblazers then recorded a block to go up 25-24 before kills by Schmidt, Gilfert and Reese after a timeout gave the Mavericks the win.