SPEARFISH, S.D.— The Colorado Mesa University Mavericks put down 46 kills, 30 more than their opponents in a dominant 25-6, 25-16, 25-13 Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference road win over Black Hills State University on Friday afternoon here at the Yellow Jackets' A2 Arena at the Donald E. Young Center.
The Mavericks, who extended their winning streak to 14 straight matches, hit .363 as a team and held the hosts to a .011 clip while improving to 22-3 overall and to 12-1 in RMAC play.
BHSU fell to 5-20 overall and to 1-12 in conference play.
CMU never trailed in any of the sets.
Maverick senior outside hitter
Sydney Leffler led the Mavericks with 15 kills on .346 hitting.
Meanwhile,
Sierra Hunt tallied 13 kills on a career-best .706 hitting from the right side while
Nicole Martin put down nine kills on .750 hitting without committing an error in the middle to record the best hitting percentage of her career as well. Hunt made just one attacking error.
Setter
Sabrina VanDeList allied 41 assists and nine digs while also registering three service aces, helping push the Mavs to a 9-2 advantage in that category.
Maverick libero
Allison Waller had 11 digs while defensive specialist
Jordan Woods chipped in ten, helping the Mavs to a big 56-29 advantage in that category as well.
The Mavericks hit .583 in the first set jumping out to a 9-1 lead before going up 22-5 later in the frame after extended serving runs by
Stormi Tadlock,
Hahni Johnson and Woods.
Leffler had seven kills in the opening frame while BHSU was held to just four as a team while hitting negative .071.
Hunt then took over in the second set, recording seven of her kills in the middle frame., which was tight early on before the Mavs went on a 7-1 run to build a 12-5 lead.
The 'Jackets closed to within 13-11 before the Mavs went on a 5-1 run that featured two Hunt kills and two of VanDeList's service aces.
CMU led 18-11 at that point and then cruised to the win as Martin put down two kills before a Woods service ace finished the set.
The Mavs then jumped out to a 9-0 third-set led with VanDeList behind the service line and were never threatened. The Mavs hit .343 as a team in the third set as Leffler put down six kills while Hunt and Martin combined for eight on ten swings.
VanDeList had 16 assists in the final set alone.
The Mavericks are now ensured of at least the No. 2 seed in next week's RMAC Tournament and will complete the regular season on Saturday afternoon at 1 o'clock when they head to Rapid City to face third-place South Dakota Mines.