ALAMOSA, Colo.— Sophomore right side hitter Maranda Theleus recorded a career-high 14 kills and hit .435 as the Colorado Mesa University Maverick volleyball team claimed 29-27 and 28-26 "overtime" second and third set wins to complete a 3-set sweep at Adams State University on Friday evening here at Plachy Hall.
 
The nation's second-ranked Mavericks are now 12-0 overall and 9-0 in Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference play after dispatching of the Grizzlies and Black Hills State earlier in the day during the 3-match RMAC pod. 
 
The Mavericks have now won three matches, all in 3-set sweeps, in a span of just over 48 hours.
 
The Grizzlies, who had defeated Black Hills State in three sets to begin Friday's pod, fell to 2-12 overall and to 2-11 in the RMAC as they wrapped up their season.
 
In Friday's nightcap, the Mavericks had a massive 51-29 advantage in total kills but watched the Grizzlies come up with 13 blocks to keep things interesting.
 
The Mavericks had five blocks of their own but did more of their defensive work in the back-row coming up with 62 digs, eight more than ASU, while allowing just two service aces.  Junior libero Kerstin Layman had a season-high 22 digs and was perfect on 20 receptions.  Freshman setter Sabrina VanDeList also joined her in double figures with 11 digs.  VanDeList also had 23 assists to record her fifth double-double of the campaign and second of the week.
 
Meanwhile, Maddi Foutz finished with 10 kills from her outside hitter position.  Savannah Spitzer and Sierra Hunt also had seven kills a piece while Haley Hahn chipped in six.
 
The Mavericks never trailed in the opening set and used a 4-0 run, led by Hunt to take a 15-11 lead after the set had been tied at 11.  The freshman outside hitter began that spurt with a kill and then served the next three points as Foutz and Hahn added kills for CMU.
 
Going on to win that set, 25-17, the Mavericks then jumped out to a 6-0 second-set lead.  They then led by as many as eight points at 16-8 but watched the Grizzlies rally to take a 22-21 lead with a 14-5 extended run.
 
The teams then exchanged points nearly one-for-one as Theleus went on to tie the set at both 26 and 27 with kills.  VanDeList then recorded a kill of her own before Hahn registered a block to give the Mavericks the set and a commanding 2-0 overall lead.   Theleus had seven kills and hit .750 in the second frame.
 
The Mavericks also took a 16-10 third set lead but again watched the Grizzlies fight their way back into it, going on an 8-1 run.  ASU would later take 22-21 and 23-22 leads before a hitting error and Foutz kill gave the Mavericks their first match-point at 24-23.
 
The Grizzlies were able to fend that off and then took a 25-24 lead on a Cindy Garcia block before an exchange of errors made the score 26-25 in favor of the home team.
 
However, Theleus took over the match, recording a kill on a Grizzly blocking error before coming up with a solo block on Anna Huggins to give the Mavericks a 27-26 lead and a second match point.
 
The West Palm Beach, Florida native then ended the match with the final kill of the night as she surpassed her 2019 fall freshman season-high of 13 kills by one.
 
Throughout the match, the Mavericks hit .148 but held the Grizzlies to a .068 clip.  CMU also had six aces as VanDeList tallied three while Ara Norwood had two while registering 14 assists and nine digs as well.
 
The Mavericks, who had recorded a 3-set home sweep of Westminster on Friday, will resume their indoor season in eight days as they play at Western Colorado University in Gunnison at 3 p.m. on Saturday, Mar. 27.  However, many of the Maverick squad members will head to southern California this Monday and Tuesday for four beach volleyball matches in Northridge and Irvine.