SAN ANTONIO – The longest road stretch of the conference season, both in miles traveled and matches away from Prather Coliseum, begins on Saturday for Northwestern State.
 
A three-match road swing into the far reaches of the Southland Conference begins with a 1 p.m. first serve at UIW on Saturday afternoon. The match will stream live on ESPN+ with live stats available at www.nsudemons.com. The Demons travel to conference newcomer UTRGV and Texas A&M-Corpus Christi next week to complete the lengthy 2,000 mile round trip over the next eight days.
 
The Demons (6-5, 1-1) won in convincing fashion against Nicholls in its last match a week ago with a sweep while getting production up and down the lineup from its offensive options. They had five players with five or more kills with both setters, Amina Attra (17) and Gabby Seeds (18), producing a nearly perfectly even split in assists.
 
With no Thursday match this week, the Demons took the extra days to solidify an early-conference offensive change.
 
"We played in a 6-2 offense against Nicholls, so we've taken this week to get more comfortable with that and improve in a few areas that we've seen where we've been lacking this year," head coach Sean Kiracofe said. "Other than changing from that offense we were running it's been business as usual this week while getting a little bit of rest and spreading that work out over the week to get ready for UIW."
 
The goal to get more attackers involved in the offense with the change showed itself against the Colonels with a leading kill mark of nine for Teresa Garza on the outside and Deja Benjamin in the middle. Garza was offered 34 attempts to score in the match to lead all players but Attra and Seeds mixed their sets up effectively over the five other attackers with all of them taking more than 10 but less than 20 swings each.
 
"I think it's been a good switch for us right now," Benjamin said. "We have a bit of a better block at the net and are able to spread out our offense better too. Having that extra option lets us not have to keep feeding the outsides or middles, we have an outlet on the right side. And having that bigger block helps out our passers behind us."
 
The bigger block led to nine rejections against the Colonels, the most in five matches since the Demons had 13 against UL Lafayette at the beginning of September.
 
Northwestern, as it has done throughout the season, will continue to look for consistency in its offense from other places than the outside. Four players are averaging between 1.35 and 1.78 kills per set this year for the Demons with both middles, Benjamin and Samaya Wesson, averaging a solid 2.0 points per set or better.
 
Spreading the offensive attack is something that NSU's opponent on Saturday has done with consistency and efficiency this season, despite their 0-3 mark in conference play following Thursday's loss to UTRGV.
 
UIW had the fourth best team hitting percentage in the conference entering Thursday's match at .216 and had only been held below .200 in four matches this year with a 3-1 record in those performances. The Vaqueros held the Cardinals to a season-low .127 behind a stellar defensive outing where they averaged 17.3 digs per set. 
 
The Cardinals' leading offensive option, among the multiple attackers that are averaging at or near 2.0 kills per set this year, Risa Sena did not play against UTRGV after four straight double-digit kill outings where she averaged 3.41 kills per set and hit an impressive .359 during that stretch.
 
"They have some good young players and some players that have been in that system for a while that are really starting to click," Kiracofe said. "It's the coach's second year so she's got a full year having implemented what she wants to do and things are running smoother than last year, and they had some bright spots and moments last year. They can jump up and beat anybody and have a bunch of different areas where they can score and attack you so you cannot get focused on stopping this one thing because they've got multiple attackers up there can do something."
 
Finley Evans, the second leading scorer this season, led the team with eight kills among the five players with four or more kills in the match.
 
As a team UIW boasts a .211 attack percentage but had their streak of four straight matches with a percentage greater than .200 snapped on Thursday. While they have averaged around 10 kills per set as a team over the first three conference matches, the mix of options to earn those kills will remain a talking point for the Demons in a critical early-season road conference match.
 
"I like to play neutral and watch the ball and try not to guess and go where the ball is," Benjamin said about defending against multiple attack options. "I try to go into every match with a lot of confidence and relaxed. I'm a blocker so whatever I can do to help my teammates out and do my job and worry about blocking the ball, that's the biggest thing."