Vikings dominate in Washington

The Portland State women’s volleyball team earned a spot in the Big Sky tournament after sweeping through their weekend road match-ups. The Vikings defeated non-conference opponents Seattle University on the road in straight-sets on Thursday night, which warmed the team up for a 3-1 win at the Eastern Washington Eagles on Saturday.

The win against Eastern Washington secured this year’s Dam Cup for Portland State. However, with one match left to go in the volleyball season, the Northern Colorado Bears have already been crowned the conference champions.

Much like the Vikings, the Bears dominated their competition this weekend. Currently, Portland State sits at 11-3 in conference and Northern Colorado 12-4 in conference. No matter what the outcome of the final teams’ matches are next weekend, the Bears own the tie-breaker, since they beat the Vikings in both meetings this season.

“It says a lot [to finish second]. There’s a lot of moving pieces, and they’re still moving,” Head coach Michael Seemann said. “On one hand, it is disappointing. We set out to go for a win every year, both to win season and conference [tournament], but at the same time it feels like our future is still ahead of us.”

The rest of the tournament bracket is also filled out, Sacramento State sits in third place at the moment and Eastern Washington in fourth. It is possible for Sacramento to tie Portland State for second place as the Hornets have two matches left, including a game against the Vikings this weekend.

Portland State opened their weekend road trip with a dominant showing against Seattle. The Vikings only fell behind three times and never trailed by more than two points in the straight-set win.

The Vikings outblocked the Redhawks 10-6, paced by sophomore Aubrey Mitchell’s match-high seven blocks.

“Blocking is the absolute pinpoint of [our] defense,” Seemann said. “The pin blockers are doing a great job of setting the ball for a block and our middles are doing a great job of closing.”

“It’s always good to come back with two wins on the road and it was awesome to have people perform like they did,” Senior libero Nicole Bateham said. “Everybody’s blocking performance was up and it’s a lot easier to play behind blocks like Katie [O’Brien’s] and the other front line players.”

On Saturday against Eastern Washington, the opening set came down to the wire. The Eagles led 25-24 when Schlatter scored two-points in a row to give the Vikings the lead, but Eastern Washington returned with a three-point run of their own to finish the first frame 28-26.

After the first set loss, the Vikings narrowly claimed the second set 25-23. From there, the Vikings heated up, limiting the Eagles to a .065 hitting percentage in the third set and a -.024 in the fourth, to claim a 3-1 win.

“[Eastern Washington] came out with a different look than we were expecting,” Seemann said. “It took us a while to tune into their rhythm, but once we figured out the puzzle we were able to be successful.”

Schlatter and Ellis both pulled down double-doubles—Schlatter with 40 assists and 13 digs, and Ellis with 17 kills and 12 digs. Bateham led the Viks with 30 digs.

“We’ve learned throughout this season what it takes to finish matches and especially to come out after halftime and play point-by-point and finish,” said Bateham.

Portland State will next play the Sacramento State Hornets in the Vikings’ final regular season match this upcoming Saturday at the Stott Center.