JOLIET, Ill. -- The University of St. Francis women's volleyball team got back in the win column following a pair of defeats with a 25-21, 25-17, 25-17 sweep of Trinity Christian College in Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference action on Tuesday night.  With the victory, the Fighting Saints are now 16-15 overall and 7-4 in the league play.

Trinity Christian (8-21, 4-8 CCAC) challenged St. Francis in the first set, answering the Saints' strong 5-2 start with a 4-0 run that gave the visiting team a 6-5 advantage.  Alyssa Teske helped put an end to the Trolls' momentum with a kill, igniting a 10-2 outburst that gave USF a 15-8 lead.  Taylor Connolly, Riley Hungate and Cadence Wodrich combined for three of the next eight points in the set for USF before Teske and Sophie Knazur shut the door with two authoritative kills to give the Saints the 25-21 vwin in Set 1.

In the second set, both squads came out firing on all cylinders, each authoring back-to-back 5-0 runs before Kaylie Sippel gave the Saints the 6-5 advantage with a kill.  The turning point in the game came when the game was knotted at nine-all.  USF severed it with a 10-2 scoring surge, headlined by two kills apiece from Desiree Anderson and Knazur to propel the Saints to a 19-11 lead and force a Trinity Christian timeout.  Four separate players recorded a kill after the break, while two attack errors ended the set with St. Francis winning 25-17.

The Saints kept climbing after winning the second set, starting the third and final game on a 9-2 run. Connolly and Teske helped the home team win the race to 10 points, while three straight kills from Anderson, Hungate and Sippel produced a 10-point advantage at 16-6.  The offense continued to remain balanced as the set closed with USF rolling through the final 20 rallies to win 25-17 and complete the 3-0 sweep.

As a team, the Saints recorded 38 kills with Connolly leading the charge with eight in the match.  Hungate and Teske each had seven kills in the win, while Sippel led the team in both assists (16) and digs (11).  USF had 14 total blocks in the match, getting four block assists from both Teske and Knazur.

Up Next
St. Francis will return to action on Saturday, Nov. 2 with a road CCAC date at Viterbo University (Wis.).  First serve is scheduled for 1 pm in R.W. Beggs Senior Gymnasium on the campus of Viterbo.

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