Grace Miller led Pitt-Johnstown with 10 kills and 13 digs, but it wasn't enough, as Gannon ended the Mountain Cats' nine-match winning streak with a 25-14, 25-19, 25-16 PSAC West victory, Friday night in Erie. Pitt-Johnstown is now 9-2 overall and 2-1 in conference-play.
Lauren Sampson and Ashley Kerestes combined for five kills to give Gannon a 6-1 lead to begin the opening set. Pitt-Johnstown narrowed it to one on a
Grace Miller kills and a
Molly Ayres/
Katelyn Courtney block, but the Golden Knights scored the next five to make it 13-7. The Mountain Cats then used Ayres' kill and a service ace from
Adiamar Beaz to cut it to 14-11, before Gannon outscored Pitt-Johnstown, 11-3 down the stretch to take the set, 25-14.
In the second set,
Cassie Pascarella's kill capped a 5-1 Pitt-Johnstown spurt that cut a five-point deficit to 12-11. The Golden Knights followed with six straight points to push the lead out to 18-11, before the Mountain Cats made it 21-18 on another kill from Miller. However, Gannon got kills from Ashley McClung and Sam
Deinek to take a 2-sets-to-none advantage with the 25-19 win.
Pitt-Johnstown kept the third set close and took an 11-9 lead on a kill from
Lualis Alvarado. It remained tight and neither team held a lead larger than two until Gannon broke open a one-point lead with an 8-0 run to close out the match with a 25-16 victory on kills from Kerestes and Sampson.
Along with Miller, Pitt-Johnstown got six kills from Alvarado and Pascarella, four kills and three blocks from Courtney, and four kills, a pair of blocks, and 10 digs from Ayres.
Lauren Gechter also had four kills for the Mountain Cats.
Beaz led the way with 30 set assists and nine digs, and
Erin Carmody collected a match-high 21 digs for Pitt-Johnstown.
Gannon, which sits just outside the AVCA NCAA Division II National Rankings, improved to 14-2 overall and 3-0 in the PSAC West, behind Sampson's 13 kills and two blocks, Deinek's 11 kills and 13 digs, and McClung's 10 kills and two blocks.
The Mountain Cats will play a PSAC West match at Edinboro on Saturday, then return home to host conference matches in the Sports Center against California (PA) on October 8 at 7 p.m. and Seton Hill on October 9 at 1 p.m.
