Historic streak ends with 3-1 loss to Northern Colorado

Thursday, October 2

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7:00 PM

Montana

10-4,2-1Big Sky

Northern Colorado

5-10,2-1Big Sky

Northern Colo.

Montana

Historic streak ends with 3-1 loss to Northern Colorado

10/2/2025 10:36:00 PM | Volleyball

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By: Montana Sports Information

The longest winning streak for the Montana volleyball program in the last 31 years came to an end on Thursday night inside Dahlberg Arena as the Grizzlies fell in four sets to Northern Colorado.

Montana (10-4, 2-1 Big Sky) held leads of at least three points in all four sets, outscored the Bears overall on the night 94-90, and outhit them .137-to-.103. It still wasn't enough to end a 12-year drought against perennial power Northern Colorado.

The loss ends a 10-match winning streak for the Grizzlies, which goes down as the 5^th longest in program history. It also ends a run of six straight home wins for head coach Allison Lawrence's squad.

"It's been incredible and I don't think any part of the streak stopping or continuing was on our mind," Lawrence said. "I think the disappointment is more that's a team that's been the gold standard in our conference and that's a team we match up really well against. Anyone that watched saw how close that was, but the disappointing thing is we got outworked in some categories and got tested in ways we haven't been. I think we're going to learn a ton from that and bounce back."

Alexis Batezel had a career night defensively in a match that saw plenty of marathon rallies. The Grizzly libero had a career-high 40 digs and moved into 6^th place in program history for career digs.

The Grizzlies needed her all night long as both sides had impressive defensive efforts. Montana jumped out to an early 6-2 lead and looked very comfortable for much of the first set. The lead grew all the way up to 14-6 after a block from Sydney Pierce and Olivia LaBeau.

Freshman Mylee Blake had a kill to extend the lead to 16-9, but after that the Bears started to chip away. They used a 5-0 run to get back within two points and then scored six of the next eight to take their first lead since 1-0 at 20-19.

The momentum was fully on the side of the visitors, but Montana was able to get it back by forcing some errors down the stretch to take a 23-22 lead. Northern Colorado scored the final three points to take the first set.

Maddie Pyles started her first match of the season after returning from injury in a limited capacity over the last several weeks. She played in the front row on Thursday night and was able to change the game a bit with her blocking. It also allowed Montana to determine the lanes that UNC could attack, which led to 11 digs in the first set for Batezel.

"I thought Maddie Pyles came in and blocked really well early and the first set and so we got a lot of balls funneled to (Batezel), which is what we wanted," Lawrence said. "I think she just read expertly and made a lot of hustle plays and good extension plays, but I don't think a lot fell in her zone and she dug a lot of hard-driven balls, too."

Montana left no doubt in the second set. After a bit of back and forth early, the Grizzlies blew the doors open with a 10-2 run that put them up 19-10. Freshman Maddie Sanderson served during a 7-0 Grizzly run as part of the stretch with three different UM players contributing kills.

They finished off the set with back-to-back kills from Delaney Russell and then back-to-back blocks from the duo of Carley Spachman and Olivia LaBeau. The 4-0 run closed it out at 25-13.

Russell had five kills in the second set as Montana hit .438 as a team while holding Northern Colorado well under .100 hitting.

The Grizzlies jumped out early again in the third set and forced Northern Colorado to take both of its timeouts at the 15-point mark in the set. The Grizzlies used a 5-0 run, once again with Sanderson serving, to jump ahead 16-10.

The hosts withstood a 3-0 run from UNC and built the lead back up to 20-15 and appeared on their way to a 2-1 advantage.

But, similar to the first set, the Bears just wouldn't go away. They continued to dig difficult balls to extend rallies and deny Montana any easy kills. Northern Colorado would use that strong defense to score 10 of the next 11 points, including the final eight points of the set, to win 25-21.

"Northern Colorado's defensive effort was pretty outstanding," Lawrence said. "Even when we were getting balls past their block, just the extension of rallies that they had took us deep into rallies. We're pretty used to scoring off our first swing, so I think having to possess the ball multiple times and play deep into rallies rattled us."

It was a similar story in the fourth set as Montana led early and used a 3-0 run to go ahead 13-10. They continued to lead into the media timeout, going into that break ahead 15-14. The fourth would be the most tightly contested set of any of them with the teams trading the lead seven times while having 15 ties.

There was a 15-point stretch where neither side led by more than a point as sideouts were common and scoring runs were not. The Bears finally broke that run by taking a 22-20 lead. They traded points to get to 23-21 before Montana finally got a run of its own.

Pierce had a clutch kill and LaBeau followed it up by putting away a UNC overpass. Carley Spachman then had a solo block to give the Grizzlies three straight points and a 24-23 lead with a chance to send it to a fifth set.

Isabel Bennett answered with back-to-back kills for the Bears to force a Grizzly timeout at 25-24. Montana fended off a match point with a huge kill from LaBeau, but the Bears would get the next two to win 27-25. The Griz entered the night 9-3 in sets decided by two points, but dropped both close ones on Thursday night.

Montana had more digs (88-85), blocks (12-8), kills (52-47), and service aces (5-4), but it still wasn't enough in a match that came down to late runs in sets and withstanding long rallies.

"It was a great defensive match on both sides, but it just felt like we got a little cold in moments where they were able to run some points," Lawrence said.

Russell led Montana with 16 kills on .115 hitting. She recorded a double-double by adding 11 digs. Pyles, in her first start of the year, had nine kills and four blocks. The Grizzlies switched up the formation a bit with setters Gracie Cagle and Annika Wright both seeing plenty of action and finishing with 19 and 18 assists, respectively.

The Grizzlies will look to start a new streak on Saturday when they welcome Northern Arizona to town for a 2:00 p.m. start. The Lumberjacks also entered the week undefeated but lost in five set at Montana State on Thursday night.