LACEY, Wash. (Oct. 17) – The Central Washington University volleyball team earned its second straight sweep, defeating Saint Martin's University 3-0 by set scores of, 25-16, 25-20, and 25-23
 
The Wildcats improve to 12-5 on the season and are now 8-2 in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference.  Saint Martin's falls to 2-15, 1-9 GNAC.
Offensively the Wildcats were led by Linden Firethorne who had nine kills and hit .318.  Kiah Jones also had a good night hitting adding seven kills while hitting .316.
As a team the Wildcats hit above their .237 average at .241 and was aided by seven services aces, 12 blocks and only 13 errors.  The CWU defense held Saint Martin's to a .100 hitting percentage on the night.

Madison Weg, Kaitlin Quirk and Jones each added 2.5 blocks on the night for the Wildcats who came into the week as the nation's leader in blocks per set.
 
"Saint Martin's is a very good team and they play with a lot of intensity," CWU Head Coach Mario Andaya said. "We needed to stay the course and weather any Saint Martin's runs, and we were able to do that in each set."
 
In the first set the Saint's kept things close for tying the frame at 11-11 before the Wildcats rattled off four straight points aided by a pair of service aces by Kiah Jones.  Linden Firethorne finished off the set with back-to-back kills handing CWU the 25-16 set win.
 
The Wildcats trailed just once in the second set at 1-2, but the Wildcats regained the advantage off a pair of Saints' errors and never looked back.  An ace by Catie Fry gave the Wildcats a 19-14 lead and Jones followed that up with a kill down the right side of the SMU defense.  The Saints pulled to within three points, but the Wildcats closed off the set with a service ace by Firethorne securing the 25-20 set victory. 
 
The Wildcats hit .207 in the second set but had four total blocks with Kaitlin Quirk picking up four block assists in the stanza.  Fry and Sabrina Wheelhouse each had three kills in the set.
 
The Saints did not go quietly in the third set holding a 21-19 lead late in the frame.  The Wildcats battled to pull within one multiple times and tied the match 23-23 on a SMU attack error.  Kiah Jones finished the set and the match with a kill to take the frame 25-23.
 
Up next the Wildcats travel to Simon Fraser University on Oct. 22 to play their third of four straight games on the road.