The No. 7 nationally ranked Park University women's volleyball program rocked a full house at Breckon Sports Center on Tuesday, dialing it up against (RV) Benedictine College in a sweep victory of the 2023 Heart Conference Semifinals, 25-18, 25-21, 25-6.

The No 1 seeded Pirates now have 25 consecutive wins on the season and 29-2 on the year heading into the Heart Championship match. The No. 4 Ravens end their season at 21-8.

Tonight, a big question mark was how the offense would operate with some uncertainty at the setter position. For unforeseen circumstances, the Pirates' serving specialist Aly Anderson got her first start as Park's primary setter tonight. Any question marks leading into the match were emphatically answered as the Pirates did not skip a beat in their normal form.

It's no easy task to fill the shoes of the probable 2023 Heart Setter of the Year in Arianna Marino, but Anderson did all of that with a double-double on 31 assists and 12 digs. This was also Park's highest hitting percentage in a match in seven matches since October 14. Tonight the Pirates hit .330.

Two early service aces for Park helped put Park on top in set one 9-4 to force a Benedictine timeout. A few more points were traded off by both teams until the Pirates widened the gap to 15-6 with a four-point scoring run, including kills by Grecia Ung and Debora Bernardi. The Pirates led by as much as 18-9 but the Ravens clawed back in by scoring the next five of six points to make it 19-14. Park had things under control though as Malaina Hensley eventually ended the set 25-18 off of a really good rally by both teams. Both pins were effective in the first set with five kills registered by Izabella Ceratti and four kills by Hensley.

Set two was by far the closest set with the Ravens gathering 14 kills to Park's 15. Impressively, the Pirates were errorless in set two on 37 attacks for a .405 hitting percentage, while Benedictine's number was at .156. A 5-0 scoring run involving two double-blocks by Bernardi and Hensley gave the Pirates a 8-4 advantage. Benedictine continued to hang around though and brought a three-point deficit, at 19-16, down to only two points at 23-21. Despite being close, there was really no contest as the Ravens were never able to knot the score up after a 4-4 tie at the beginning of the set. Bernardi announced herself with a solo block to the end the set 25-21. Ung was pure gold for the Pirates with eight kills in the second set alone and was tonight's leading attacker with 17 kills. She joins Anderson in the double-double column with 11 digs.

The Pirates took a 4-1 lead out of the shoot and a 9-6 lead for Park looked relatively tame, but then the Pirates went to warp speed with 16 straight points to lead into the Heart Championship, 25-6. Irene Verdino did the honors with the 16 serves to close out the match and had one service ace in that stretch. For the match Verdino earned two service aces and did not commit a single service error. The Ravens only managed collect one block in the match, while the Pirates had seven with four coming in the final set.

Ceratti and Hensley were close to double-figures in kills with nine and eight, respectively.

Ceratti led the defensive effort with 14 digs and Bernardi led all players with four blocks, including a solo block.

The No. 1 Pirates will face No. 2 Central Methodist University in the 2023 Heart Conference Tournament Championship on Saturday, November 11 at 2pm. This has been the Heart Championship matchup the last three of four seasons. WATCH HERE
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