Down 24-25 in the second set last Tuesday against Walsh University, the Point Park University volleyball team could easily have panicked as they had never defeated the Cavaliers.But on this night, Lindsey Oberacker spiked the ball past the Walsh defenders, setting the stage for the first ever win in Point Park’s history against Walsh.The historic win- three sets to zero began a highly successful weekend that ended with the Pioneers winning five more games at the Clearwater Christian Tournament in Florida to raise their record to 26-4.Assistant Coach Neal Brown noted the significance of the win over Walsh, which lost its first game of the season to Point Park.”It’s a great accomplishment, Walsh is a great team and they’ve proven it every year,” Brown said. “The core of juniors they have continue to get better and better, but I think our core of juniors have gone against them as has gotten even better. They did a great job of executing.”Emotions were high at the Greentree SportsPlex last Tuesday as the team took on rival Walsh. According to Point Park Athletics website, 125 fans showed up to root on the Pioneers.The first set went back and forth and neither team really pulled away until closer to the end of the set, when the Pioneers won 25-21.The second set started out with much of the same, but then the Pioneers pulled away taking a 20-14 lead. In a match such as this one, a six point lead was huge, however Walsh played themselves right back into the set, led by outside hitter Julianne O’Donnell who along with Oberacker is being considered a top player in the American Mideast Conference (AMC.) It took the Oberacker kill in the second set to save it for the Pioneers and after more back and forth, the Pioneers capitalized on a set point, rescuing a ball from the seats, keeping it in play and then getting the point, causing the crowd to rise to its feet.The third set continued as a back and forth match, but Point Park led 15-13 in the set before they had a big back and forth exchange with Walsh. Both teams made athletic digs, hard spikes and sharp passes but still were unable to get the point. Point Park ended up winning the point, exciting the team and Head Coach Mike Bruno, who knowing how important the point was, made an enormous fist pump in celebration.”I’ve always told the kids that it is about ball control,” Bruno said. “On that rally there were multiple transitions and I told the girls you’ve got to hang in there and keep fighting. Those are the types of rallies that will change the complexion of match or continue the momentum, and in that case they continued to work hard.”The team then made a substitution, subbing in outside hitter Keaton Sausman who promptly on match point stood tall at the net spiking the ball for the kill and giving the Pioneers the victory. This was something that immediately struck Brown once he knew that his team had won the match.”We brought a freshman in to make a big play and she made the big play,” Brown said. “It doesn’t matter whether it is freshman, sophomore, junior or senior, we played as one team and that’s been the goal all along.”The team then took a two hour flight to Clearwater, Fla., so that they could participate in the Clearwater Christian Tournament.The team played their first three matches last Friday facing Florida Christian and its 9-12 record going into the match, Northwood and its 7-12 record going into the match and Ave Maria and its record of 6-9 going into their match.Point Park defeated all three opponents three sets to zero with the closest set, a 25-20 win, coming in their second set in their Northwood match.The final two matches of the tournament were against Grace College who had a 19-6 record going into the match and host Clearwater Christian and its 22-5 record heading into the match.In the match against tournament runner-up Grace, Point Park lost the second set 23-25, but won the match in four hard fought sets.Outside hitter Chelsea Katkich, who recorded a career-high and team-high 16 digs in the match against Walsh, noted how hard it was to play against Grace.”They are very quick on their offense,” Katkich said. “The first set, we had a lot of trouble adapting to their middle hitters, they ran a lot of slides and had a lot of fast sets, so our blocking had to adapt to that. Our defense also had to shift a little bit because of where the hits were going. Our coach told us that was what we were going to see in Nationals, if we make it that far.”Against Clearwater Christian, Point Park won 25-22 in the first set and then won the next two sets by a larger margin, winning the match in straight sets to win the tournament.Point Park has now won a season-high 11 matches in a row, a feat of which the team feels very proud.”It definitely makes me feel confident and seeing all of those wins lets us know that we’re good,” Katkich said. “Having all of those wins is a good thing, but we also can’t get cocky, and we have to be on our toes and ready for competition because anyone can come out and play a better match than us on any given day and we cannot let that happen.”