Nov. 14, 2001

Box Score

DENVER - Sophomore middle blocker Olympia Hughes (Casper, Wyo. / Natrona County HS) and senior outside hitter Kellie Savage (Arvada, Colo. / Arvada West HS) each had 11 kills to lead the University of Denver to its first-ever Sun Belt Conference Tournament win, a 3-1 (30-19, 30-27, 30-24) decision over Arkansas State in first-round action Wednesday night at Hamilton Gymnasium. The Pioneers (13-15), the No. 4 seed in the West Division, advance to face No. 1 East seed Western Kentucky at 2:30 p.m. MST on Thursday. Arkansas State, the No. 5 East seed, falls to 7-19.

Denver, which leads the league in blocks per game as a team, had 11 more on the night, led by six each from senior setter Clarice Golesh-Burch (Lakewood, Colo. / Mullen HS) and sophomore middle blocker Andrea Baron (West Vancouver, British Columbia / West Vancouver HS), who leads the league in blocks individually.

The Pioneers held the Indians to a paltry -.020 hitting percentage in the first game. Denver didn't burn up the stat sheets with a .216, yet in the second game hit a robust .359 and finished with a solid .250 to end the match with a .277 hitting percentage.

Michal Evers led the Indians with 11 kills and a match-high 13 digs.

"For this being the first time we've won a tournament match, the monkey feels like it's sliding off a little," said Denver head coach Beth Kuwata. "In general, this was probably the most aggressively we've played in a while, and our whole attack was much better. We had a little more balance offensively tonight, and our ball-handling was good. But we'll have to get even better than tonight if we're going to play well tomorrow."

In the day's other matches, No. 3 East seed Arkansas-Little Rock swept No. 6 West seed South Alabama to advance and play No. 2 West seed Louisiana-Lafayette tomorrow at noon, and No. 5 West seed New Orleans defeated No. 4 East seed Middle Tennessee in four games to earn the right to play No. 1 West seed New Mexico State at 7:30 p.m. In the day's third match on Thursday, No. 2 East seed Florida International will face No. 3 West seed North Texas.