Nov. 18, 2007

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CHARLOTTE - #16 Dayton secured its fourth Atlantic 10 Volleyball Championship title in the past five years with a 3-0 (30-24, 33-31, 30-26) victory over Xavier on Sunday afternoon at Halton Arena. The win gives the Flyers (30-1) their first 30-win season in modern history and an automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament.

"Xavier is a great opponent and I was glad to see that our girls were up to the challenge today," UD Head Coach Tim Horsmon said. "We talk about winning championships at Dayton. Winning the regular season and getting the number one seed was big. Our season is not done yet, we have a lot of goals we want to accomplish."

UD will learn its NCAA First Round site and opponent on Sunday, November 25. The NCAA Selection Show is tentatively scheduled for 8 p.m. ET on ESPN News. Dayton will also be making its fourth NCAA appearance overall.

"All of these high pressure situations, playing with everything on the line, are good for us," Horsmon said. "We are playing in a Thanksgiving tournament with some tough teams. I'm hearing maybe we can get an opportunity to host some NCAA tournament games and get a good seed and get some winnable matches, which would be great for our program."

Senior Jamie-Lee Richards earned A-10 Tournament Most Outstanding Player honors after recording a match-high 20 kills while hitting at a .279 clip.

Richards was joined on the All-Tournament Team by Erin Schroeder who not only dished out 54 assists, but led the Flyers in digs for the second day in a row with 20. Overall, UD out hit XU .285 to .231 overall.

Redshirt freshman Lindsay Fletemier hit .538 with 17 kills and three blocks followed by nine kills, one service ace and one block for the Flyers, which also hold the best record in the nation.

Junior Kortney Norris finished with eight kills and 10 digs while freshman Yvonne Marten had a solid performance of her own with five kills and five blocks including three solo.

Senior libero Adrienne Green picked up 17 digs of her own as she pulled to within 13 digs of becoming just the 25th player in NCAA Division I history to rack up 2,000 career digs.

The Flyers started the match on a tear with an 11-4 run behind the strong play of Lindsay Fletemier and Jamie-Lee Richards. Each player put up three kills while Richards added an ace just inside the left line during a rally that saw UD by as many as nine at 15-6. Xavier pushed back to within three before a timeout followed by kills from Bethany Akerhielm and Richards followed by a block from the duo of Fletemier and Erin Schroeder swung the momentum back to the Flyers ahead 26-21 en route to a 30-24 game one victory.

Dayton out hit Xavier .309 to .216 in the opening game behind 21 assists from Erin Schroeder. She also picked up nine digs and two kills of her own to give the Flyers a 1-0 lead in the match. Lindsay Fletemier and Jamie-Lee Richards added seven kills each while Adrienne Green picked up 10 digs of her own for UD.

Game two was back and forth as neither team built more than a two-point lead from the midpoint of the game on. Dayton earned the first game point at 29-28, but a Xavier block extended the action at 29-all. Jamie-Lee Richards gave UD another chance off a beautiful back set than was hit down the right line. However another Musketeer block evened the score again at 30-30. After a Flyer attack error that gave XU a 31-30 advantage, Dayton called a timeout and responded with a kill by Lindsay Fletemier in the middle of the floor. UD followed with a block from Yvonne Marten and Bethany Akerhielm to force another game point that the Flyers would finally take advantage of. Akerhielm picked up a kill off a Xavier overpass to end the game in Dayton's favor, 33-31.

Jamie-Lee Richards continued her strong play with another seven kills in the second game followed by Bethany Akerhielm with five of her own. Xavier out hit UD .184 to .170 despite 16 assists and seven digs from Erin Schroeder. Both teams put up 5.0 blocks in game two including four by freshman Yvonne Marten (two solo, two block assists) for the Flyers which took a 2-0 lead in the match.

Dayton fought off an early charge by Xavier in game three to finally take a lead at 21-20 on a kill from Lindsay Fletemier. That point started a stretch of four out of five points going the way of the Flyers including a service ace by Adrienne Green. After Jamie-Lee Richards ripped her sixth kill of the third game to force an XU timeout at 28-25, the Musketeers picked up a kill to pull within two. However, it was all UD from then on as Lindsay Fletemier earned her fifth kill to force game point at 29-26. Dayton finished the match with a block by Fletemier and Kortney Norris to take home the Championship.