Griz end regular season with road sweep
11/22/2008 12:00:00 AM | Volleyball
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The University of Montana volleyball team closed out the regular season with its fourth straight win Saturday night, posting a 26-24, 21-25, 25-22, 27-25 victory at Idaho State. The Grizzlies improved to 14-12 overall and finished tied for third with Northern Colorado in the final Big Sky Conference standings at 10-6.
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The 10 Big Sky victories were the most for Montana in league play since 1994.
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Montana will be the No. 4 seed at next weekend???s Big Sky tournament in Portland, Ore. The Grizzlies will face No. 5 Weber State Friday morning at 9:30 a.m. (PT) at Portland State???s Stott Center. The winner of that match will play top seed Eastern Washington Friday night at 5:30 p.m. (PT) in the first of two semifinals.
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No. 3 Northern Colorado will face No. 6 Sacramento State at 11:30 a.m. (PT) in the other first-round match. The winner of that match will play No. 2 Portland State in the late semifinal Friday.
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The tournament championship match is scheduled for 7 p.m. Saturday.
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Montana was out-hit and out-blocked by the Bengals Saturday night, but had a season-high 96 digs and made the key plays to pull out tight victories in sets one and four. The Grizzlies faced set points by ISU in both but rallied back to win.
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???I couldn???t be prouder of how hard and determined we played this weekend,??? coach Jerry Wagner said. ???We were behind numerous times in both matches late in sets, and that???s when we became an ever tighter unit.
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???The players are confident and believing in what we???re doing. We???re as sharp as could be going into the tournament next weekend.???
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Sophomore Amy Roberts had 18 kills and a career-high 22 digs, sophomore Jaimie Thibeault finished with 12 kills on .400 hitting and added a team-high five blocks and sophomore Brittney Brown had 28 digs, her second-best total of the season.
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Junior Taryn Wright had 52 assists and 13 digs, while senior Jade Roskam was Montana???s other defender to reach double-figure digs with 15.
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Britta Bartschi had 22 kills and Jaclyn Hone 20 for the Bengals, who ended their season at 10-20, 5-11 in league play.
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The Grizzlies fell behind 24-23 in the opening set but used back-to-back attack errors by Idaho State and a Roberts kill to score the final three points and take the early 1-0 lead.
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Idaho State had 18 kills to UM???s eight in the second set to even the score at 1-1, but the Grizzlies limited the Bengals to .087 hitting in the third to retake the lead, 2-1.
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Montana had a match point at 24-23 in the fourth set after a kill by junior Whitney Hobbs but a bad set by the Grizzlies and an ISU block gave the Bengals a 25-24 lead and their first set point.
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Hobbs made it 25-25 with a kill, then repeated it on the next point to put Montana up 26-25.
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A kill by freshman Brittany Quick ended the match.
