DENTON, Texas (Oct. 7) – The TWU volleyball team rolled to its fifth straight win with a sweep against visiting St. Mary's in a non-conference game Wednesday night in Kitty Magee Arena. 
 
The Pioneers won, 25-19, 25-18, and 25-13, and improved to 13-3 on the season.
 
Freshman Makayla Mayfield led the Pioneers with a .308 hitting percentage and 10 kills while junior Mallory Kuechle recorded a double-double with 10 kills and 12 digs.  Senior Joey Redwine posted 31 assists while junior Sara Oxford had 11 digs. 
 
In the first set TWU jumped out to a 7-2 lead before the Rattler scored four straight points to cut the deficit to one.  The Pioneers responded with six straight points of their own to push the lead back to seven.  TWU maintained at least a five-point lead the rest of the way before winning the set by six points.
 
The Pioneers again jumped out to an early 9-4 lead in the second set.  With TWU leading, 12-7, the Rattlers went on a 5-0 run to tie the score.  The Pioneers regrouped and used a 7-3 run to take control of the set.  Leading, 21-18, TWU scored four straight points to close out the set.
 
In the third set the Pioneers trailed 5-3 early but scored 10 straight points to take a 13-5 lead.  TWU posted a .429 hitting percentage in the set for 12-point win.
 
"It was an ugly game and a different style of play compared to most of the games we played this season," said TWU head coach Shelly Barberee.  "We couldn't use our block with that style of play.  We did not match-up well as far as our blocking goes and couldn't use our size defensively.  We tried to control the game at our pace offensively and we were able to do that towards the end of second set and the entire third set."
 
The Pioneers will return to action when they host Texas A&M-Commerce on Friday, Oct. 9.  First serve is scheduled for 7:00 p.m. in Kitty Magee Arena.