SANTA CLARA, Calif. – In the final game of the regular season, Santa Clara volleyball took down Saint Mary's 3-0 in the Leavey Center. Set scores were 25-18, 25-22, and 25-15. Santa Clara is 22-9 and 12-6 in the WCC. Saint Mary's is 12-19 and 5-13 in the WCC.
The Broncos will finish tied with San Diego for third place. BYU won the automatic bid and with a 3-1 win at USF, Pacific clinched second place. The Division I Women's Volleyball Committee will make selections for the 2014 NCAA Tournament this week. The 64-team field will be announced Sun., Nov. 30 at 5:30 p.m. Pacific on ESPNU. There will be 33 at-large bids. The Broncos' RPI this week is No. 45 and they have defeated four top 20 teams this year, including WCC champion, then-No. 11 BYU, 3-0 on Oct. 30 and the league runner-up, Pacific, 3-0 on Sept. 30. They also defeated then-No. 20 Duke 3-0, then-No. 24 LMU 3-2 and then-No. 23 San Diego 3-1. The Broncos finished 7-3 in their last 10 matches.
"All year long we've talked to this group about routine, routine, routine," said Bronco head coach Jon Wallace. "Earlier in the year we had a lot of two way conversations about who we wanted to be. Nights like tonight when you have a lot of distractions, great distractions like Senior Night, a must-win in order to get to the tournament, our girls were stuck on their routine. They did a great job of trusting it and executing it"
Santa Clara hit .254 with 49 kills (20 e, 114 att.). The Broncos collected 44 assists, seven aces, four service errors, 54 digs and eight team blocks.
Nikki Hess led the Broncos with 14 kills while hitting .154 (8 e, 39 att.). Taylor Milton added 12 kills while Sabrina Clayton had 10. Kirsten Mead had 41 assists and Danielle Rottman had 25 digs.
Saint Mary's hit .186 with 30 kills (11 e, 102 att.). The Gaels collected 28 assists, seven service errors, 34 digs and 16 team blocks.
Samantha Tinsley led the Gaels with 10 kills while hitting .206 (3 e, 34 att.). Dalas Dodd added 25 assists and Madi Wilkerson has 12 digs.
In the first set Santa Clara jumped out to a 4-1 lead but the Gaels came right back with five straight points to take a 6-4 lead. A kill by Milton finally ended the run but Saint Mary's answered right back. After the teams traded points, Santa Clara came up with three straight points to go up 13-10. Back-to-back blocks by Kaity Edwards and Milton stretched the Santa Clara lead to 16-11. Clayton followed a kill with a block to make it 21-15 Broncos. The Gaels called for a timeout. Santa Clara was able to win the first set 25-18. SCU hit .379 with 16 kills (5 e, 29 att.). Hess had five kills.
In the second set Santa Clara fell behind 5-4 but came back with three straight points to get on top 7-6. Saint Mary's came back to take the lead 10-9 after falling behind by two. Hess came up with a kill to tie the game again. Three straight points by Saint Mary's caused Santa Clara to call a timeout. The Broncos would tie the game at 17-17 but the Gaels came back with two straight points. Santa Clara tied it again at 19 before taking the lead on a kill by Milton. Three straight points for Santa Clara made it 23-20 and the Gaels called for time. After Saint Mary's scored two in a row, Santa Clara answered with a timeout. Out of the timeout, Milton had a kill to set up set point. GiGi Cresto came in to serve but Saint Mary's called its final timeout of the game. The Broncos won the point and the set 25-22. SCU hit .111 with 16 kills (11 e, 45 att.). Milton had six kills.
In the third set the Broncos jumped out to a 5-2 lead. With the Gaels trailing by just one, Hess came up with a kill to make it 7-5. An ace by Mead that hit the top of the net put Santa Clara up 10-6. With the score 14-11, Santa Clara rattled off four consecutive points and Saint Mary's called a timeout. The lead kept growing out of the timeout with four more points in a row. A kill by the Gaels made it 22-12. Milton finished it off with a kill. SCU hit .325 with 17 kills (4 e, 40 att.).
