Monday, September 15, 2014

PORTLAND, Ore. - After a strong showing at the GNAC/PacWest Crossover last weekend, Northwest Nazarene's volleyball team has been selected the GNAC Red Lion (@redlionhotels) Team of the Week.

The Crusaders won all four of their matches against PacWest foes in the tournament.  They were 3-0 winners in their last two matches.

“The tournament was a cool thing; we had a really good weekend,” NNU head coach Doug English said.

Playing in Riverside, Calif., Northwest Nazarene started the tournament off with a 3-1 victory over Point Loma Nazarene. Michelle Terpstra (S, 5-9, Sr., Ripon, CA) recorded a triple-double in the match with 10 kills, 14 digs and 34 assists. 

She has been selected the GNAC Co-Player of the Week along with Sara Biondi of Seattle Pacific.

Friday’s second contest was the closest match the Crusaders had in the tournament, which they won three sets to two against Dixie State. After taking the first set, NNU dug itself into a hole by dropping the next two, but it won the pivotal fourth set 26-24 and defeated DSU 15-11 in the fifth for the match win.

“That was a tough matchup,” English said. “Dixie is a great passing team and it took a while to figure out how to slow them down. We did a great job of making plays when we needed something.”

The third and fourth matches on Saturday were the most dominant for the Crusaders, beating both Azusa Pacific and host Cal Baptist 3-0. Six players recorded at least 12 kills in the last two matches, including Andrea Terpstra’s (MB, 6-4, R-Jr., Ripon, CA) team-high 23.

The conference as a whole went 20-12 in the crossover tournament which was played at two sites (Riverside and San Rafae) and finished with a 48-33 record in non-conference play, which is the best in GNAC history.

“The conference did really well,” English said of the tournament performance. “It’s great for (the GNAC) to play against such a high level of competition.”

With the tournament over NNU will focus on conference play which starts for most teams Tuesday.

Northwest Nazarene has a bye on Tuesday and will take on Central Washington Thursday.  Both the Crusaders and Wildcats completed the non-conference portion of the schedule with the best records in the GNAC (7-1).