SAN DIEGO—The Sea Lions hosted the Argonauts of Notre Dame de Namur in their conference home opener on Wednesday night and Point Loma was able to earn their first conference victory of the season. The first set was hard fought with the Sea Lions holding on to go up 1-0 with a 25-23 win. A strong offensive set helped PLNU out to a 2-0 set lead with a 25-17 win, but the Sea Lions struggled with errors in the third set falling 25-23 to NDNU. In another back-and-forth set Point Loma battled the Argonauts to extra points to take the fourth set 27-25.

Cara Keturakis was a stud in the match coming one kill shy of a triple-double with 50 assists, 11 digs, and 9 kills. Holley Persson led a strong defensive effort from the Sea Lions with 33 digs, and was one of five players who had double-digit digs for PLNU. The defense was able to hold Bianca Alvarez, the reigning PacWest Player of the Year, to a .122 hitting percentage in a game where she had 82 attack attempts. Point Loma also had a solid offensive outing as three players notched double-digit kills, Madelynn Fox lead the way with 14 kills.
 
Team Records
PLNU (4-6, 1-1), NDNU (6-4, 1-1)
 
Scott's Thoughts
On his team's ability to win close sets:
"This was a good match of seeing killer instinct out of several different players at several different moments. It was nice that we weren't forced to rely on just one person who happened to be hot, several players stepped up at different times."
 
On the performance of Keturakis:
"She gets to be the Cara who we are training her to be, and who she is naturally, when our passing and digging was as good as it was tonight. This is as good as we've been all year in those two categories, which allowed her to shine a little bit, but her success is a reflection of the passers and the diggers."
 
On the outstanding defensive effort:
"That was the first match of the year where I was satisfied with our defensive intensity. That is something we have established over my years here and it is finally starting to come out this season with this team."
 
On a balanced offensive attack:
"We had some confidence through most of this match and when we have that players step up. It wasn't so much about the stats, but for several players the mental side was on point."
 
On what his team needs to continue their success going forward:
"We've got to stay focused on us, how we can score the next point, how we can get the next dig, or the next block. It doesn't really matter who is on the other side of the net right now for us."

 
Scoring Summary
Set 1: PLNU 25, NDNU 23
Set 2: PLNU 25, NDNU 17
Set 3: NDNU 25, PLNU 23
Set 4: PLNU 27, NDNU 25

 
News and Notes
> Keturakis has one previous triple-double for her career, there have only been three other triple-doubles recorded in school history.
> After going down 6-3 in the fourth set, the Sea Lions scored 8 straight points to go up 11-6.
> Point Loma hit .254 for the game, one of their best marks of the season, despite a third set where they had a zero hitting percentage for the set.
> Julia Malinas and Ashlynn Fresques each tallied 10 kills for the Sea Lions.
> Megan Angerstein and Itali Andrade each had season-high totals for digs with 17 and 16, respectively.
> PLNU improves to 12-1 all-time against Notre Dame de Namur.

Up Next
PLNU will be at home once again on Friday, September 22 when they host the undefeated Lancers from California Baptist University.