Griz win 7th straight, longest streak since 1994

Thursday, September 18

Spokane, Wash.

7:00 PM (MT)

Montana

7-3,0-0Big Sky

Gonzaga

6-4,0-0WCC

Montana

Gonzaga

Photo by: Ryan Brennecke / University of Montana

9/18/2025 10:45:00 PM | Volleyball

Box Score

By: Montana Sports Information

The Montana volleyball program had waited 31 years for this moment, so they knew it wasn't going to come easy. The Grizzlies, seeking the program's first seven-match winning streak since 1994, battled an impressive Gonzaga team on the road on Thursday night in a matchup of 6-3 teams.

It went the distance in an offensive slugfest with both teams throwing everything they had at one another for nearly three hours of volleyball. In the end, Montana's precise offense outlasted the hosts in a 3-2 win in Spokane.

"I think the part that feels really good to acknowledge is how much desire this group has to be great," Lawrence said. "I'm so happy for them that they are getting a reward for their commitment to greatness because their habits and mindset have been so locked in to creating these types of opportunities for themselves. It's great to see it happening."

The Grizzlies hit .329 as a team, collecting 68 kills while committing just 14 errors. The firepower was similar on both sides, but it was the 26 attacking errors committed by Gonzaga that proved to be the difference in the match.

A big reason for that was the defense of Montana. The Grizzlies had 12 blocks to Gonzaga's five, and Carley Spachman outblocked the Bulldogs on her own with six on the night. If she wasn't blocking it at the net, Alexis Batezel was likely there to clean things up in the back row for one of her 28 digs on the night.

Montana had five different players reach double digits in kills on the night in another impressive offensive performance. They have now hit over .250 in all seven wins during the streak and went over .300 for the fifth time.

Delaney Russell led with 14 kills. The trio of Sydney Pierce, Mylee Blake, and Olivia LaBeau all had 13 kills. Carley Spachman had 11 kills to go with her six blocks. It didn't matter who was getting the attacks at any moment, the team was celebrating each kill like it was their own.

"I think this team is so hungry to win together and I think they play with a deep desire to find success for and with each other," Lawrence said. "I think everyone takes that responsibility on their shoulders that they are going to win it for their teammates, so when it's their time to step up they all just step up."

The offense starts with Montana's ball control, but the play of setter Gracie Cagle has been huge for the Griz over the past three weeks. She earned the Big Sky Offensive Player of the Week honors after her performance last weekend and backed that up on Thursday.

Cagle had 45 assists and 13 digs for her sixth double-double of the season.

"Gracie just delivers such consistency with her setting and such smart decision making that she's able to distribute in a way where hitters have multiple kills in front of them every time they swing," Lawrence said. "I think when she's doing that, things look really good."

The Griz led from the start and were in control for much of the first set as both teams came out hot offensively, setting the tone for what would be a thrilling attacking match all night long.

Montana had the Zags at an arm's length for much of the set, but Gonzaga went on a 5-0 run to take their first lead of the match and then extend it out to 19-16.

The teams would both go on runs as momentum swung back and forth down the stretch. The Griz went on a 3-0 run with kills from three different players after a timeout to tie it at 19-all.

Gonzaga responded with four straight points of their own to go up 23-19. Montana would make things interesting late with a 3-0 run to cut the lead back to 24-23, but the hosts would hold on to take the first set.

The Zags took the momentum from the first set win into the second and scored five of the first six points to match their largest lead of the match. Gonzaga would build the lead up to 11-6 and looked in complete control until a kill from Carley Spachman sent Cagle to the service line.

Cagle would serve for 10 straight points as Montana took an 11-6 deficit and turned it into a 17-11 lead. The serve from Cagle was the catalyst of the run as she had three service aces during the stretch and kept the Bulldogs off balanced.

Spachman also played a huge role in the stretch with three kills and a solo block during the 11-point Grizzly run, which was the largest of the season for Montana. The run came right after a Grizzly timeout where Lawrence talked with her team about being more aggressive.

"We are such a good serving team but we were not showing that. We were way too tentative and they were so in rhythm," Lawrence said. "Gracie did that by herself. She just went back and owned it, and it gave our team such a belief that anyone could put that service pressure on them.

"It flipped our mentality and fueled our belief, and maybe led to some Gonzaga doubt," Lawrence continued. "It flipped the match and stole us a lot of momentum."

Gonzaga would get back within three points, but Montana closed out the set with five of the final six points for a 25-18 set win. The Grizzlies hit over .300 for the second straight set, recording 13 kills and just two errors for a .333 hitting percentage as a team. They also had three service aces to bring the total up to five through the opening two sets.

Montana went up 5-2 early in the third set with the only two Gonzaga points coming off service errors for the Griz. The aggressive service game benefitted Montana much more than it harmed them on the night with six service aces total.

Gonzaga began to pull away and looked in complete control after an overpass from Montana resulted in an emphatic kill from Donkers that looked to make it 24-21. But Donkers swing through the ball into the net, giving the point instead to Montana and turning the tables in the set.

Montana followed up the attacking error with a kill from Pierce to tie it up at 23-all and force a Gonzaga timeout. The Grizzlies went to Russell out of the timeout and she delivered with a kill to make it set point.

The Griz defense withstood several bombardments from the Gonzaga attack, digging up balls that appeared destined to hit the ground on multiple occasions to extend the point. They finally ended it with a block from Pierce and Sophia Vella that gave the Grizzlies a 25-23 win and a 2-1 advantage.

Vella's block on set point was indicative of just how deep this Montana team is with the true freshman contributing in key moments. Annika Wright, another freshman, also had several key plays coming off the bench as a reserve and finished the night with a career high 13 digs.

"We were having some passing trouble in some of our two hitter rows," Lawrence said. "Annika came in and Sophia Vella came in to give us a third arm in those rotations and stress their block a little bit more, and both of them stepped up huge."

It was another early lead for Montana in the fourth as they went up 7-2 after a kill from LaBeau. Gonzaga wouldn't take the lead in the fourth until it was 21-20, but they closed it out in emphatic fashion, scoring seven of the final eight points for a 25-21 win to force a fifth set.

For the third straight set, Montana seized control early. They scored five of the first six points, two of which came on kills from the true freshman Blake, and forced an early Gonzaga timeout.

They wouldn't ease up, building the lead to as many as six and never letting the Zags back within four. Blake had the finishing touch of the match on an overpass from Gonzaga. She sent it straight to the floor to cap off a 15-10 win.

Montana withstood a very impressive match from Gonzaga's star Sjakkie Donkers, who had a match-high 22 kills. They also were very good in the serve-receive. To slow Donkers and limit the Bulldogs' serve, they needed their passers to be on point.

"Our passing core was resilient yet again through some really good serving by Gonzaga. We knew coming in that they would try to serve us off the court just because they're really physical, their serving numbers are good, and our offensive numbers are so good that you have to get us out of system to put pressure on us," Lawrence said. "They did that at first and got us out of sync a little bit, but our response with ball control was so good."

Once again a major reason for that was the play of senior libero Alexis Batezel.

Batezel climbed into the top 10 in program history for career digs. She jumped Amy Roberts and Sadie Ahearn to move into 9^th place with 1,169 digs in her career, and Montana needed nearly every one of her 28 on Thursday.

"I thought she stole some big-time kills and scrapped in some moments where I think it definitely changed the momentum of the match and made us the grittier team," Lawrence said. "I think that put a lot of stress on their offense."

It was never easy, but Montana got the job done for win number seven.

"It feels really good. It was another match where it was such a team effort," Lawrence said. "It was really fun to see our responses to adversity tonight. I thought there were so many moments in the match where our backs were against the wall for whatever reason, but our response was always unified and so individually accountable of everybody being willing to do their jobs and find another gear."

It also improves the Grizzlies to 1-1 on the year in five-set matches and gives them a little taste of the pressure that comes with those types of matches before they head into Big Sky play.

"Five set matches are stressful, for obvious reasons, but I'm really glad we were in one because we're going to need that experience big time for conference," Lawrence said.

This is Montana's best 10-match start to a season since also opening 7-3 in 2005. It's just the 13^th winning streak of at least seven matches in program history and the first since 1994.

The Grizzlies will look to add onto those streaks on Friday when they face Seattle U in a neutral-site match in Cheney, Wash. The Redhawks lost a five-set match to Eastern Washington on Thursday night to fall to 6-4. The match starts at 3:00 p.m. (MT) and will not be available to stream.