SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Sacramento State outside hitters Sloan Lovett (20) and Morgan Stanley (17), and rightside hitter Kayla Beal (15) each posted double figures in kills to lead the Hornets to a 3-1 victory (23-25, 25-23, 25-19, 25-19) over Northern Arizona in a Big Sky Conference volleyball match Friday evening at Colberg Court.
The Hornets hit .313 as a team, including .438, .414 and .303 in sets 2-4, respectively. Four of the team's six starters hit at least .270, including Stanley (.412), Lovett (.342), middle blocker Chelcy Motes (.667) and Beal (.270).
The win convincingly snapped Sacramento State's seven-match losing streak as the victory came over a Northern Arizona squad (8-4, 2-1) that was among the Big Sky's top teams thus far. The Hornets, who improved to 6-8 overall and 1-2 in the conference, return to action tomorrow night when the team hosts Southern Utah at 7 p.m. Tonight began a stretch of four straight, and eight of the next 10 matches at home for Sacramento State.
After the Hornets dropped a very close 25-23 decision in the first set, Sacramento State's passing and attacking were impressive the rest of the way. In fact, the Hornets combined to hit .383 during the second through fourth sets while committing just 11 attack errors over that span.
"I was very pleased with our serve receive passing, and that really set up our offense as we attacked really well," Sacramento State head coach Ruben Volta said. "Hannah (Hettinga) did a nice job running the offense and got everyone involved.
"I really liked the way we played in the second set after dropping a close first set, and we seemed to feed off that energy the rest of the way. We've lost some matches this year and we are a young team, but our players continue to work hard and get better."
Sacramento State had nine more kills (61-52) and 13 more digs (50-37) than the Lumberjacks, and took advantage of 15 NAU service errors. The Lumberjacks had just 37 digs in four sets against the Hornet attack as zero Northern Arizona players finished with double figures in digs.
Stanley's 17 kills matched her season high, and she added 10 digs for her fourth double-double of the season. Lovett's 20 kills were one shy of her career high, and she also added nine digs and a pair of blocks. Beal tallied double digits in kills for the seventh time this year, Hettinga finished with 53 assists and Aprile's 20 digs were two shy of her career high.
Motes' six kills came without an error in nine attacks, and her five blocks were a team high.
For NAU, Janae Vander Ploeg had 14 kills and Taylor Stephens added 10 kills.
