By: Paxton Ritchie
CSC Sports Information Director
CHADRON, Neb. – Chadron State volleyball snapped an eight-game losing streak in rousing fashion with a 25-21, 25-20, 25-15 straight sets win over Black Hills State as part of the RMAC Power Pod on Saturday at the Chicoine Center.
After facing Black Hills State (6-15) on the road in Spearfish twice earlier this year and failing to win, Chadron State (5-16) ensured that welcoming the Yellow Jackets to their home floor would be a different story. The Eagles were simply dominant, hitting a season-best .409 (the fifth-best single-match hitting percentage in an RMAC game this season) and hammering home 52 kills, a season-high for a three-set match.
Freshman Shelby Harding hit a career-high 12 kills on a .611 hitting percentage and added a team-high 13 digs. Mataya Ward matched Harding with 12 kills on a match-high 30 attempts, hitting .333 on the night.
Other offensive stars included Gibson Beckler (eight kills, .368), Kally Kirkwood (seven kills) and Chloe Grady (seven). Grady, who tied a season-high with her seven kills, was errorless on 10 attempts for a sparkling .700 hitting percentage, which is CSC’s highest by any player with 10 attempts or more this year.
Setter Jillian Donovan contributed another double-double with 25 assists and 12 digs while redshirt sophomore Cydnie Eskew competed in all three sets in a collegiate match for the first time in her career, setting a new career high with 15 assists plus four digs.
The Eagles had 52 kills, 50 assists and 57 digs, plus four aces and five blocks. Black Hills State hit .130 for the match and did not register a block.
The two teams went back-and-forth early, but Chadron State seemed to grow more and more dominant as the match went on. In the first set, CSC and BHSU had 10 ties between 0-0 and 13-13, but the Eagles went to Harding for back-to-back kills to take a 15-13 lead.
Soon after, a Bella Adams/Kally Kirkwood block ignited a 4-0 run with kills from Kirkwood and Ward plus a Harding ace to put CSC up 20-15. Chloe Grady recorded back-to-back kills followed by a combo block with Ward to put the Eagles ahead 24-18, and although the Yellow Jackets saved three set points, CSC closed out the set 25-21.
Black Hills State was determined to even the score, using a 5-0 run to move in front 11-7 in set number two. Chadron State one-upped BHSU’s run after trailing 13-11, winning six points in a row that featured three kills in a row from Harding to take a 14-13 lead followed by Gibson Beckler and Bella Adams kills to help add on. Chadron State won the final three points of the set, highlighted by a Grady/Harding block, to win 25-20.
Mindful of the Yellow Jackets coming back from two sets down in the schools’ first meeting of the year, Chadron State kept its foot on the gas and did not allow any signs of life for Black Hills in the third set. The Eagles fed Mataya Ward, who slammed home kills on four of the first five CSC points of the set.
Chadron State effectively ended the match with a 6-0 scoring run to jump out to a 10-2 set lead. The Eagles benefitted from three BHSU attack error plus an ace from Ward in that span, and two more BHSU errors gave the Eagles a 13-4 lead later on. From that point on, Chadron State never led in the set by less than eight points and punctuated the sweep with a kill from Kirkwood.
Chadron State hit .500 as a team in set three, with 16 kills and no attack errors on 32 attempts. By contrast, the Yellow Jackets had six kills and six errors on 27 tries for a .000 third-set percentage.
The Eagles will try to establish a winning streak with another RMAC Power Pod match this Saturday at 3 p.m. against New Mexico Highlands (9-12). Before that happens, Black Hills State and New Mexico Highlands face one another in a neutral-site match at the Chicoine Center on Friday at 6 p.m.