Bearcats Fall to No. 18 Truman on Senior Night

MARYVILLE, Mo.—The Northwest Missouri State volleyball team was defeated Friday night on Senior Night by 18th-ranked Truman. Set scores went 19-25, 23-25 and 18-25. In all, six Northwest players played their final match in Bearcat Arena. They are: Sara Falcone, Amber Guthrie, Iesha Haskins, Rachel Nisi, Amber Ryan and Paige Spangenberg.

The loss drops Northwest to 15-13 overall and 11-8 in the MIAA. More importantly, the Bearcats’ final match of the season on Saturday with Missouri Southern becomes a virtual must-win if Northwest wants to feel safe about making it into the NCAA Regional Tournament. The Bearcats currently rank seventh in the region with Nebraska-Omaha eighth and Southern ninth. The top eight teams from the region make the tournament, but the Heartland Conference receives an automatic bid from its conference winner, and right now no Heartland team is ranked in the region.

Alex Hanna led the Bearcats with nine kills in the match. Guthrie and Ryan each added six kills, while Ryan added two assists, two digs and four block assists. Falcone chipped in with five kills and had four digs and two total blocks in the match.

Laira Akin led Northwest with 31 assists. Akin also had the Bearcats’ only two service aces of the match. Akin added seven digs and a block assist as well. Spangenberg led the Bearcats with 11 digs, Spangenberg now needs 21 digs to move into sole possession of second-place on the MIAA’s career digs list. Nisi added nine digs for the Bearcats to go along with a kill and a block assist.

Truman (24-7, 13-6 MIAA) hit .312 in the match while Northwest hit .152. Though the Bearcats out-blocked Truman, the Bearcats committed three more service errors and five more attack errors in the loss.

Northwest will travel to Joplin, Mo., for a Saturday night game with the Lions at 5 p.m. The Bearcats swept Missouri Southern earlier this season in October in Maryville.