ROLLA, Mo. – After breaking a four-game losing streak with a straight-set win on Saturday, Missouri S&T's volleyball team will have its first full weekend of action at Gibson Arena as it hosts matches on Friday and Saturday.

The Miners, 7-4 overall and 1-1 in the Great Lakes Valley Conference, will host William Jewell Friday at 6 p.m., before taking on Rockhurst in a 3 p.m. match Saturday at Gibson Arena.  Fans who attend Saturday's game can use their ticket to also attend the Missouri S&T football game that evening against Hillsdale at Allgood-Bailey Stadium.

S&T dropped a four-set decision to an undefeated Quincy team on Thursday before bounding back with a resounding win Saturday at Truman State, as the Miners took control of the affairs roughly midway through the first set and went on to knock off the Bulldogs.  Madelyn Mason (Mount Horeb, WI/Mount Horeb) had a game-high 12 kills to lead S&T, while Abigail Widiker (Hammond, WI/Saint Croix Central) had nine kills and nine digs and Hannah Merjil (Bakersfield, CA/Garces Memorial) recorded 21 assists.

Mason leads the Miners with 116 kills which ranks eighth in the GLVC, while Jordan Burton (Olathe, KS/Olathe South) has recorded 109 kills and Shelby Ply (Rolla, MO/Rolla) 104.  Ply owns the second-best hitting percentage in the conference at .383 and also ranks second in blocks with 44 on the year.

The Miners also have two other players that ranks among the GLVC leaders in Madison Offerman (Herscher, IL/Herscher), who is fourth in blocks with 40 on the season and Lexi Netherlain (Sullivan, IN/Sullivan), who ranks in a tie for seventh with 14 service aces.
 
As a team, the Miners rank third in hitting percentage in the GLVC at .232 and have held opposing teams to a .159 mark.  S&T also ranks second in the conference with 2.51 blocks per set.

ABOUT THE OPPONENTS:  William Jewell comes into Friday's match at 7-8 on the season, but dropped its first two GLVC matches at the hands of Southwest Baptist and Drury last weekend.  The Cardinals had a five-game winning streak earlier this season that was the program's longest since 2016.

The Cardinals are hitting .207 as a team and are led in kills by Bella LaPorta with 200; her average of 3.57 per set is the fifth-highest in the GLVC.  Tatum Ernt and Alex Dvorak both rank among the top 10 in the GLVC in hitting percentage, as Ernt is seventh with a mark of .313 and Dvorak is hitting .304.  Haidan Beade ranks second in the conference in digs with 4.54 per set, but opposing teams have hit .198 against the Cardinals this season.

Rockhurst brings an 8-2 overall record into play this weekend and won its GLVC opener in four sets Saturday over Southwest Baptist.  The Hawks' only two losses this season have come to nationally-ranked teams, as they dropped matches to eighth-ranked Southwest Minnesota State and to No. 17 Central Missouri.

The Hawks have one of the better defensive teams in the GLVC, as they have allowed opposing teams to hit just .149 against them and are third in the league in blocks with 2.32 per set.  Maureen Reilly leads the GLVC with 5.55 digs per set, while Kenzie Hines has a team-high 118 kills.  Sarah Montague ranks ninth in the conference in assists with 6.16 per set and also has 15 service aces to her credit; Hines has added 14 service aces.