CONWAY, Ark. – Sophomore outside hitter Seven Powers and senior outside hitter Alexia Southern paced the Southern Arkansas attack with a combined 24 kills on Tuesday evening inside A.R. Reddin Fieldhouse and the Lady Muleriders came away with a convincing straight sets victory (25-14, 25-20, 25-16) over Central Baptist College in a non-conference affair in Conway.
 
Powers produced a season-high 13 kills on a career-high .588 attack percentage (13-3-17), while Southern's 11 kills served as her 10^th career double-digit kill game as a Lady Mulerider and first of her senior season.
 
Freshmen Bailey Cagle and Madi Pfeifer attacked well in the three-set win as the duo combined for ten kills and an average .692 attack percentage.
 
Helping pace the SAU attackers were a pair of setters that saw time on Tuesday. Sophomore Alexa Bass led Southern Arkansas with 20 assists and senior Savannah Pillow added 11. Sophomore defensive specialist Whitney Brown added a game-high 11 digs as she led SAU in the category for the third game in a row.
 
The Lady Muleriders' ten total blocks in the win mark the third match this season with double-digit blocks. SAU managed just one double-digit block performance as a team in 30 games last season. Senior middle hitter Alli O'Banion as well as Powers led SAU with six total blocks.
 
It was all Southern Arkansas from the first serve as the Lady Muleriders trailed just once midway through the second set. A 12-6 SAU run closed out the opening set and Southern Arkansas would close the second set on a 6-1 run highlighted by a Southern kill, a Morgan Gross service ace and four lady Mustang attack errors. In the third set, the Lady Muleriders opened on an 18-7 run before cruising to the match victory.
 
The Lady Muleriders tallied 44 total kills and a team season-high attack percentage of .370 as they picked up their first three-set sweep of the 2017 season. Defensively, SAU forced the Lady Mustangs to a three-set attack percentage of .062.
 
The Lady Muleriders remain on the road and jump back into Division II play as they head to Austin, Texas, this weekend for the SEU Hilltopper Classic hosted by St. Edward's University. The two-day invitational begins on Friday, September 8, and runs through Saturday, September 9, and will see Southern Arkansas play a pair of matches on both days, with three of the four matchups serving as in-region tests.
 
A tournament page with live game links for all of this weekend's action can be found here: http://gohilltoppers.com/sports/2017/6/2/tournament-central.aspx.