Montana finishes perfect weekend at home with doubleheader sweep

Saturday, September 6

Missoula, Mont.

9:00 AM

Montana

2-3,0-0Big Sky

North Dakota State

4-1,0-0Summit League

North Dakota St.

Montana

Photo by: Ryan Brennecke / University of Montana

Montana finishes perfect weekend at home with doubleheader sweep

9/6/2025 3:51:00 PM | Volleyball

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By: Montana Sports Information

The Montana Grizzlies matched their longest home winning streak since 2018 on Saturday with a doubleheader sweep of North Dakota State and Oakland. The Griz won eight straight sets and dominated offensively to improve to 3-3 on the season and win the title at the Ellesyn Invitational.

North Dakota State entered the day at 4-0 on the season before the Grizzlies rolled through in a 3-0 sweep of the Bison. They followed that up with a 3-1 win over Oakland in the final match of the weekend.

Olivia LaBeau recorded nine kills on .571 hitting in the win over NDSU and followed it up with 12 kills on .407 hitting against Oakland. She was named to the All-Tournament Team after recording 31 total kills on .537 hitting for the weekend.

"I'm really proud of our team," head coach Allison Lawrence said. "It's hard to play five straight hours of volleyball. We got about 35 minutes off, and that's on me for putting our team in that position, but we have to be able to take parts of this and know we can go to the conference tournament and play back-to-back days."

Montana 3, North Dakota State 0 (25-23, 25-18, 25-23)

It was an early start to the day with a 9:00 a.m. first serve and it took Montana a while to get things rolling, but once they did they were incredibly hard to stop. They used a 6-1 run to move ahead 12-10 after the slow start and led the rest of the way.

Freshman Mylee Blake had a huge first set for the Grizzlies with six of the team's 14 kills while hitting .312. The Grizzlies hit .205 as a team in the 25-23 opening set win and held North Dakota State to just .175.

The second set once again saw Montana use a big run just before the media timeout. They scored six straight and took 12 out of 15 total points to lead 13-7. They used a stout defense to take the lead, holding NDSU in the negatives nearly halfway through the set.

They continued to pull away and took a 20-11 lead after a 5-0 scoring run with Gracie Cagle serving. They would cruise to a 25-18 second set win behind .323 hitting. Sydney Pierce and Carley Spachman combined for seven kills on 10 swings in the second set.

In the third, Montana started strong and seemed well on the way to an easy sweep after a Pierce ace made it 23-14. The Bison didn't go away easily, reeling off five straight and scoring nine of the next 10 points.

The Grizzlies went to the All-Tournament performer LaBeau to seal the win and she delivered with a rocket that closed things out in straight sets.

Blake led Montana with 11 kills in the first match and LaBeau was second with nine on .571 hitting. Gracie Cagle had 29 assists, nine digs, and four kills while controlling Montana's efficient offense. The Grizzlies hit .267 as a team and held NDSU to .119.

The win snapped a four-match losing streak to North Dakota State that included two losses in 2024.

Montana 3, Oakland 1 (25-12, 25-20, 21-25, 28-26)

The Grizzlies and Golden Grizzlies met for the second time in the last 24 hours and once again it was Montana that came out on top to improve to 3-3 on the year.

Montana's defense had Oakland in trouble the entirety of the first set as the Golden Grizzlies were held to a negative hitting percentage with seven total errors. Montana hit .278 and ran away in the first with a 13-point win. It was the largest set win of the season.

The Griz offense then caught fire in the second set as they raced ahead 19-12. Montana had 15 kills in the second set before they committed a single error. The lead would shrink down the stretch, but Delaney Russell delivered the final blow on a 25-20 win in set number two.

Russell had six kills on .600 hitting in the second set and fellow sophomore Pierce had five on .625 hitting. As a team, Montana hit .400 to pull out a slugfest of a set that saw Oakland have its best set of the weekend at .311 hitting.

Oakland made a massive lineup change in the third set and took a different offensive approach. The move paid off as they scored six of the first nine points and had Montana on their heels early.

The Grizzlies bounced back with Annika Wright serving and jumped out to an 18-14 lead. It looked like they were on the way to the third straight sweep of the weekend, which would have been the first time since 1999 that Montana had won nine straight sets.

But Oakland wasn't ready to be done with the weekend and scored seven straight points to go ahead 21-18. They held on for a 25-21 win in the third to extend the match.

The teams traded runs in the fourth set with Oakland scoring six straight to go ahead 12-9 after Montana led early.

LaBeau had a huge stretch in the middle of the set that included some terminal blocks and huge kills that gave Montana momentum and a 16-15 lead. Oakland went back ahead 20-16 after a 5-0 run and held the lead down the stretch.

The Grizzlies fended off three set points in the final moments of the set. The biggest point that they saved was at 24-23. Lawrence had changed to a 6-2 to get more offensive arms on the floor, and freshman setter Annika Wright was put in a nerve-wracking situation.

The freshman was fearless in the moment and delivered for her team with a kill on a sneaky dump that went to the floor right in the heart of the Oakland side.

"So many proud moments but I think the biggest moment for me today was when we flipped to a 6-2 late in the set because we weren't getting enough kills from our middles, we needed three arms on the court, and our freshmen setter comes in and delay dumps to score," Lawrence said. "It was one of the ballsiest plays I've seen in a long time and just sucked the air out of the other side of the court."

Oakland then led 26-25 and appeared to win the set when a violation was called on Montana. The scoreboard showed 27-25, but a challenge from head coach Allison Lawrence changed the Grizzlies' fate.

Oakland went into the net before Montana's violation, and the point was reversed to set up a 26-all tie. LaBeau ripped a ball down the line to give Montana its first lead since 16-15 and Russell finished off the best performance of her career.

Russell ended the match with a career high 22 kills on .404 hitting. She handled a heavy load offensively with 47 swings and handled it well with a season-low three errors.

The sophomore was one of the more veteran players on the floor for the Grizzlies down the stretch of both the third and fourth sets. Montana had three true freshman and two sophomores share the floor together in the crucial moments.

It shows the level of trust that Lawrence has in her young core of players.

"I have 100 percent confidence and I think more importantly the team has 100 percent confidence in anyone at any moment," Lawrence said. "I think that's in our leadership, we don't have a hierarchy in our bench or locker room or how we designate leadership. I think those moments really allow our young players to step in and take control and that's why we brought them here was to do those things."

It was a tough first weekend offensively for the Grizzlies but they bounced back in a big way at home. The Griz hit .321 as a team against Oakland, the second time this weekend that they eclipsed the .300 mark.

Overall, Montana hit .306 over the three matches of the Ellesyn Invitational and held their opponents to just .178 hitting. The offense came behind the setting game of Gracie Cagle, who totaled 115 (11.5/set) assists.

Russell led Montana with 38 kills on .265 hitting for the weekend, but four Grizzlies had at least 28 kills. The balanced attack was deadly from all over the floor.

"I think our middle and right presence has been unstoppable. Olivia LaBeau was outrageous this entire weekend honestly, but I think what allowed it to take an uptick was our left side production," Lawrence said. "Delaney hit so well today and Miley added a lot of stability to the left side. I think as soon as we had that threat there and there wasn't a situation where they could scheme as much on us offensively."

Montana will return to the road next weekend, heading to Terre Haute, Ind. for the Indiana State Tournament. The Grizzlies will face the hosts on day one and follow it up with matches against Butler and Eastern Illinois.