Crushing the ball and hitting .720 in the third set, Santa Clara defeated tournament host Seattle tonight 3-0.  The Broncos won 25-15, 28-26 and 25-14. Santa Clara, 1-1, plays Eastern Washington tomorrow at 1 pm to finish out its play in the Emerald City.

"We passed much better tonight.  We set our middles quite a bit and they did a great job. It was a hectic day with two matches to start.  We showed up tonight and played really focused.  We were able to get the ball to Dana and Tanya more and they played really well.  They played an all-around game; they blocked well and played their rolls really well, blocking and hitting.  We played a little bit of 5-1 and 6-2 - we went back and forth a little bit.  It will take awhile to get 100 percent comfortable in that and it might have hurt us this morning, but this evening it seemed a little better. Alysssa has a great serve - we need to find her time on the court," said Bronco head coach Jon Wallace.  "Wow, I didn't realize we hit .720 in the third game.  We passed the ball well and hit the ball well - it's incredible that we hit that type of percentage. We are looking forward to wrapping up play tomorrow."  

Santa Clara hit .347 with 48 kills (13 e, 101 att.).  The Broncos added 49 digs, 44 assists, three service aces and six team blocks.  Seattle hit .155 with 29 kills (14 e, 97 att.).  The Redhawks added 32 digs, 25 assists, one ace (and 10 service errors) and 4.5 team blocks. 

Individually, Santa Clara was led by the sparkling play of its two All-WCC middles, Dana Knudsen and Tanya Schmidt.  Knudsen hit .769 with 11 kills, a block solo and a block assist. The .769 is tied for No. 7 on the Broncos all-time best single match list with 2 others.  It's the highest percentage a Bronco has hit in a match since All-American Anna Cmaylo hit .778 vs. Portland on Oct. 8, 2005.

Schmidt hit .688 with 11 kills and two block assists.  Katherine Douglas continued her fine comeback after being redshirted last year, collecting 10 kills, hitting .269 with three digs and two block solos.  Kaleigh Durket hit .467 with eight kills and six digs.  Alexandra Palmer collected 28 assists and five digs.  Alyssa Anderson also played, scoring 11 assists and four digs.  Libero Bridget O'Hara scooped up 18 digs and four assists.

Seattle was led by Cristin Richards 16 kills, hitting .293.  Setter Megan Augustavo scored 23 assists and nine digs.

The Broncos hit .143 in the first set, .293 in the second and .720 in the deciding set.  The Redhawks hit .000 in the first set, .225 in the second and .286 in the third.