Box Score
SIOUX CITY, Iowa --- Three-hundred and sixty-three days ago the 2014 Park (Mo.) team eliminated Biola Volleyball in the NAIA National Semifinals. On Wednesday the Eagles had the chance to return the favor and beat Park 3-1 and ended the Pirates' season.
 
It was the first time in three tries the Eagles have been able to finish off Park and it ends a year of agony that held a monkey to the back of this team. The win clinches a 3-0 pool play run for Biola and leaves the team in a state of limbo as it awaits other results to find out if it will play a match in the morning on Friday or advance directly to the quarterfinals.
 
Despite the convincing look of a four-set win (25-21, 25-19, 22-25, 25-18), it was actually a see saw battle throughout as the Eagles had moments where they struggled to get through a Park defense that was scrappy and able to get its hands on just about everything.

"Park played phenomenal and defended amazing," said Head Coach Aaron Seltzer. "It didn't matter what they did, those kids never gave up and they were relentless. It was a very mentally taxing match for us, but I am very proud of the team and thought they did a good job."
 
Park's primary issue was being unable to get around a tremendous Biola blocking effort. The Eagles ended the match with 10 blocks, but were especially deadly through the early portions of the match getting six blocks through the first set and a half.
 
Alyssa Mason led that effort with her three solo blocks and three block assists. Her marvelous tournament run continued with an all-around impressive performance with 16 kills and a .424 attacking percentage on the night.
 
Keeping Park behind the block helped the Eagles storm out to a 2-0 lead in the match, but a four-point run by Park in the middle of the third set helped carry the Pirates to a third-set win that forced the Eagles to start sweating as flashbacks of Park's win by way of reverse sweep earlier in the year.
 
The fourth set was the best volleyball of the match as both sides saw their hitting percentages raise from the .100s into the .400s. The set was tight all the way up until it was 16-16 and Park's setter had to leave the match due to injury.
 
That's when the confidence, crowd support and chemistry backing this 2015 Biola team helped them take over the game. The team won nine of the final 11 points to zoom to its 25-18 third set win and claim its first-ever win over Park.
 
"For us it was a matter of being patient, very patient, and allowing things to develop," said Seltzer. "We had to cycle through the offense a couple times until we found the look that we liked."
 
Joclyn Kirton and Britta Blaser also stepped up on the big stage as the two seniors each got 13 kills on their combined 53 swings.
 
The Eagles' defense grinded it out in a challenging four sets and the team's servers did well enough to win despite Park's continual efforts to "ice the server" by stopping the game every few points to clean the perspiration from the floor.
 
Biola had seven service aces to its six service errors. Four of those came on two back-to-back sets of aces, one from Becca Branch and one from Crissy Cunningham.
 
Biola and fourth-seeded Madonna advance out of Pool E. The Crusaders went 2-1 and clinched their spot in the second round with an emotional four-set win over Evangel earlier in the day.
 
Get more information on the Eagles' tournament future and a full bracket update at http://athletics.biola.edu/sports/2015/11/28/WVB_1128152709.aspx?id=213.