BILLINGS, Mont. – The No. 21 Rocky Mountain College volleyball team will return to Frontier Conference play this weekend with a pair of road matches. The Battlin' Bears play at MSU-Northern on Friday at 7 p.m. in Havre. They will then face Providence on Saturday at 2 p.m. in Great Falls.
Live video will be available for both matches through the host school's athletics You Tube channel. Live stats can be found on the Rocky DakStats page. All links will be made available on game day on Facebook and Twitter by following @BattlinBears.
Rocky enters the road trip at 17-8 overall this season and 6-1 in Frontier matches. They are currently second in the conference standings, one-half game behind Montana Tech for the top position. The Battlin' Bears are 7-3 in their past 10 matches and 4-2 in road matches.
The Bears are coming off a 2-2 weekend at the Grand View Tournament in Des Moines, Iowa. The highlight of the weekend was a 3-2 win over then-No. 1 Viterbo on Saturday afternoon. It was the team's first win over a ranked opponent in six attempts this season.
Rocky starts the week second in the Frontier by hitting .213 and they lead the conference at 13.2 kills per set. Rocky is also the Frontier leader at 20.0 digs per set and they are second in assists (12.2) and blocks (2.3). They place second in the NAIA in digs per set.
Olivia L'Ami leads the Battlin' Bears with 268 kills and she is second in the Frontier at 3.15 kills per set. She has been in double figures in kills 10 times with two 20-pluis kill matches. L'Ami is hitting .190 and has 31 blocks.
Daniella Russell is second on the team with 212 kills – 2.52 per set – and she has a team-best 69 kills in Frontier matches. She has 10 matches with double-digit kills and is hitting .161 with 36 blocks.
Hailey Copinga ranks in the top-three on the team in every statistical category. She is third with 196 kills and .255 hitting. Copinga leads Rocky with 76 blocks and she is second with 290 digs, 81 assists and 17 aces. She has been in double figures in digs 15 times this season and in 12 of the past 13 outings.
Sydney Matheny has totaled 152 kills and is hitting a team-best .330. She is second on the team with 71 blocks and is fifth in the Frontier at 1.00 blocks per set.
Natalie Hilderman has 851 assists on the year to average 10.01 assists per set. She leads the Frontier in both categories while ranking 29th in the NAIA is assists per set and 35th in total assists. Hilderman has added 258 digs and has 17 double-doubles.
Holland Fergurson ranks 27th in the NAIA at 5.28 digs per set and she is 41st with 449 total digs. She is second in the Frontier in both of those categories. She has been in double figures in digs in all but two matches this season and had 20-plus digs 11 times. Fergurson had a career-high 34 digs in the upset of Viterbo to help her reach 1,000 career digs at Rocky.
