November 9, 2004 in Sports

Eastern can wrap up the Big Sky title this weekend

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Eastern Washington, after clinching at least a share of its third-consecutive Big Sky Conference regular-season volleyball championship with wins over Sacramento State and Northern Arizona last week, heads to Montana this weekend with a chance to win the title outright.

The Eagles (18-6 overall, 11-1 in the Big Sky) play at Montana on Friday and at Montana State on Saturday night, needing a win over either the Grizzlies (6-16, 3-9) or Bobcats (16-7, 8-4) to claim the title on their own and earn the right to host the Big Sky Tournament that starts on Thursday, Nov. 18.

The only team with a chance to steal the host’s role from EWU is Sacramento State (21-7, 9-3), which must beat Idaho State (11-15, 7-5) on Thursday and Weber State (4-24, 2-10) on Saturday and hope Eastern loses both matches on its swing into Montana.

In such an unlikely scenario, Eastern and Sac State would share the regular-season title, but Sac State would host the Big Sky Tournament by virtue of the league’s tiebreaking formula. The first consideration in case of a tie is head-to-head competition between the two co-champions, which solves nothing, considering the two teams split their regular-season matches with both winning at home.

The second tie-breaker, however, is the total percentage of games won between the tied teams, and in that case Sac State would earn the host’s role having won four of the seven games played in the two head-to-head matches.

None of that, however, concerns Eastern coach Wade Benson, who is convinced his Eagles – who were picked to finish third in a preseason poll of league coaches – belong right where they are and are capable of closing the deal with a win over Montana on Friday.

“I’m always expecting to be here,” said Benson, who had to replace five key players from last year’s 22-8 team that lost to Sac in the finals of the league tournament and failed to receive an at-large bid to the NCAAs. “But at the same time, we had to fill a lot of different spots out on the court, and we didn’t know exactly how they were going to be filled until fall came.

“It took us a little while to get used to each other and, as a coaching staff, to plug players into the right spots. So, there were a lot of ifs, ands and buts, which is why I think most coaches put us second, third or fourth. I just think it’s a tribute to the kids to be able to get it together as quickly as they did and put themselves in this position again.”

The Eagles, who opened the season by losing six of their first seven matches – including five against teams ranked in the Top-25, have now won nine matches in a row and 17 of their last 18.

They swept Montana 3-0 and knocked off Montana State 3-1 at home earlier this fall.

Eags Jensen shares award

Eastern Washington’s Ashley Jensen, a 6-foot-1, junior transfer from Golden West (Calif.) College, has been named the Big Sky Conference’s co-player of the week, along with Sacramento State’s Sandra Bandimere.

Jensen registered 30 kills and hit .553 last weekend as the Eagles knocked off Sacramento State and Northern Arizona at home. She had 15 kills in each of the two wins and made seven solo blocks against Sac.

Bandimere averaged 5.67 kills and 3.11 digs in the loss to EWU and a win over PSU.

Senior Night at Idaho

Idaho (15-9 overall, 7-7 Big West Conference) returns to Memorial Gym on Thursday night to take on league rival Cal State Fullerton (13-11, 5-9) before closing its home schedule against UC Riverside (11-14, 3-11) on Saturday.

Both matches start at 7 p.m. and the Vandals will honor seniors Mandy Becker, Brooke Haeberle and Sarah Meek as part of Senior Night ceremonies prior to Saturday’s match again UC Riverside.

Becker broke UI’s career dig record in last weekend’s sweep of Cal Poly and now has 1,125 – eight more than previous record holder Heather Kniss. Becker also holds the Vandals’ career record for double-figure dig matches with 63.

Zags honor seniors early

Despite having its final home match, a non-conference affair against Montana, scheduled at 6 p.m. next Monday, the Gonzaga Bulldogs (4-21 overall, 0-11 West Coast Conference) will honor its four seniors – Lauren Armas, Christina Dave, Emilee Gihring and Rebecca Wood – prior to Saturday’s 7 p.m. league showdown against Pepperdine (8-13, 5-5) in Martin Centre.

The Zags host league rival Loyola Marymount (14-9, 5-5) at 7 on Thursday, before closing out at Portland on Nov. 20.

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