SAN ANTONIO – Northwestern State volleyball kept the momentum rolling on Saturday afternoon picking up another road win in the Southland Conference.
 
For the second time this year, the Lady Demons (11-7, 3-1 SLC) needed five sets to dispatch their opponent taking down Incarnate Word (4-14, 0-4 SLC) in a thriller 3-2 (25-19, 25-19, 22-25, 23-25, 15-13).
 
"I'm never going to complain about a win, especially not a road win," coach Sean Kiracofe said. "There are some things that I hope we handle better when we find ourselves in the same position again, but we put ourselves in a position to win and took the match. I'll always be happy with that."
 
NSU was impressive in the first two sets of the match.
 
The Lady Demons hit better than .400 in each of the first two and used dominant stretches at the ends of both sets to take the 2-0 lead in the match.
 
An 11-4 run closed the first set with every NSU point coming from either a kill or a block. Five different players recorded kills during the stretch and NSU rolled to the 25-19 first set win.
 
It was a 4-1 run that ended the second set for the Lady Demons. Reagan Lee picked up a pair of kills, along with an ace from Hannah Brister and the 25-19 set winner from Cayman Sutton.
 
The third and fourth sets were less efficient offensively for the Lady Demons, dropping to hitting percentages below .200 in each frame. UIW took advantage of the drop in production and evened the match at two sets each.
 
The fifth set turned into the Hannah Brister show for the Lady Demons. The two-time SLC Player of the Week carried her team with seven kills of the 15 points they needed to win. Alexis Warren provided the final two points that sealed the close 15-13 set win that sent the Lady Demons to a 3-1 conference record.
 
"Hannah is one of the best players in the SLC," Kiracofe said. "Good luck stopping her when the match is on the line. We didn't change anything at the end and didn't feel like we needed to.
 
"UIW did a good job starting in the third serving aggressively and it affected us for a while, but when we needed it the offense and Hannah did smart things with the ball."
 
Both Brister and Warren finished the match with 18 kills. Senior libero Megan Lohmiller became the ninth player in program history to record 1,000 career digs with 17 in the match. Kourtney Seaton had eight blocks from her spot in the middle of the NSU defense.
 
The Lady Demons return home for a Tuesday match with Lamar scheduled for a 6:30 p.m. start at Prather Coliseum.
 
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