Lady Saints Set For Dual With Hutch

MATCH PREVIEW:

The eyes of the Jayhawk Conference will be on the Greenhouse tonight as the Hutchinson Lady Blue Dragons invade Liberal for a matchup with the Seward County Lady Saints.  A win for the Dragons tonight would clinch their 3rd straight Jayhawk West title while a win for Seward would put the Lady Saints in the drivers seat for a 2nd place finish in the conference standings. 

The first time these two hooked up it was Hutchinson taking a four setter in the Sports Arena.  Seward owned the first wire to wire thanks to a fluent offense and a number of Blue Dragon service errors, but the Lady Saints fell flat after that as they hit -.084 the rest of the way as Hutch breezed to wins in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th to take the match 3-1.  Nicole Kinser dominated for Hutchinson, hammering down a career high 19 kills and hitting .545 in route to being named Jayhawk West Player of the Week that week.

Seward comes into tonight winners of 9 of their past 10 contests, but the Lady Saints have struggled slightly in their past two Jayhawk West victories.  Going up against a Dodge City squad that had lost 22 in a row on Saturday, Seward dropped the 2nd set before coming back to win 3-1.  In that victory the Lady Saints got big performances out of Carolina Gasparini and Thayna Silva who combined for 29 kills and 39 digs. 

Hutchinson has quite simply dominated the Jayhawk Conference this season, coming into tonight with a perfect 12-0 record in league action.  In fact, the Lady Dragons have dropped just 5 sets during that 12 match conference winning streak, led by sophomore Nicole Kinser who is averaging over 3.50 kills and 1.00 blocks per set.