MORAGA, Calif. — In the first three wins of the year for Saint Mary's Volleyball, the Gaels needed five sets to take care of business. After going the distance and winning against Portland on Tuesday, the Gaels decided to make things a bit easier on Wednesday afternoon, sweeping the Pilots with scores of 25-21, 25-21, and 25-19 to earn their first three-set win of the year, and their first sweep of a series this season. Saint Mary's improves its record to 4-6 while the Pilots fall to 1-9, with all matches for both teams in conference play.
 
BLOCK PARTY
What stands out immediately about the final numbers from the match on Wednesday is that the Gaels recorded a season-best 12 blocks on the afternoon. Three of those stuffs were solo blocks from Trinity Durfee, Jennifer "Boo" Laird, and Selbie Christensen. Some of the assisted totals were even gaudier in the best way, with Durfee setting a career and Gaels season best with six assisted blocks, followed closely by Chandler Cowell who put up a career-best five assisted blocks. Laird and Christensen each added three assisted blocks as the Gaels out-blocked the Pilots 12-5, their largest margin of the season.
 
LATE RUSH TO THE SWEEP
After taking the first two sets in 25-21 fashion, the Gaels were out in front in set three again until Portland went on a 6-0 run to take a 15-13 lead. The Gaels then capitalized off an attack error from the Pilots to regain control on a 7-1 run that was spurred by back-to-back service aces from Alosina Thompson. Portland called a timeout and was able to close the gap to 21-19, but then the Gaels closed it out with four-straight points, including a pair of kills from Elena Baka (who led SMC with 13) and a pair of ball-handling errors from the Pilots.
 
HOW SWEEP IT IS
With the win on Wednesday, the Gaels earned their first sweep of the season, and their first win straight-sets. The last time the Gaels were able to achieve either feat also came against Portland during the 2019 indoor season, when the Gaels capped off a season sweep of the Pilots on November 7 at home. The win for Saint Mary's vaults the Gaels up the conference standings as they now sit in sixth place overall and just one match behind LMU for fifth place in the conference standings.

BROWNING BITES
"We made some good adjustments after yesterday's match. Our blocking was significantly better and we were much more efficient attacking on the left side. Alosina and Ella did a really nice job running our offense today and Abby anchors our serve receive and defense really well." - head coach, Rob Browning
 
UP NEXT
Saint Mary's will return to indoor action on March 2 when they travel to Stockton to take on the Tigers of Pacific in WCC play. 6:00 pm is first serve and the two squads will resume their series on March 9 inside UCU Pavilion. In the meantime, the Gaels will hit the sand courts on campus and play their first beach matches of the spring when they host Oregon on Friday at 2:00 pm and USF on Saturday at 9:00 am.