Mercer Volleyball Heads North to Face North Dakota

MACON, Ga. – Mercer Volleyball will make the trip up north to take on the North Dakota Fighting Hawks on Sept. 4-5 in the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center.

The Bears (1-2) will play two games this weekend, with the first being set for Friday at 7 p.m. ET (6 p.m. CT) and the second one starting at 7 p.m. ET (6 p.m. CT) on Saturday.

Mercer Bears

Mercer opened their season last weekend at the Troy Invitational, picking up a comeback win over Alabama State on Saturday after being down 2-1 with a nine-point deficit in the fourth set. The Bears saw Lara Matta have a breakout weekend, totaling a career-high 25 kills and 14 digs for her first collegiate double-double on Saturday. She finished the weekend with 44 kills (4.0 kills/set) and currently ranks third in the conference in both kills and kills per set. Sammi Bergjans also had a strong weekend, ranking fourth in the conference with 83 assists (7.55 assists/set) while adding 21 digs and six service aces. She also recorded a double-double in Saturday's match while recording a career-best 44 assists in the Bears' win against the Hornets.

Last season, Mercer and North Dakota faced off in Hawkins Arena as part of the Mercer Invitational. The Bears came away with the win, led by Aubri Martin, who posted a double-double with 24 digs and 10 assists while adding four service aces, and Avery Wilks, who led the team with four blocks and added eight kills.

North Dakota Fighting Hawks

The Fighting Hawks enter this weekend's matches at 1-2 with their one win coming against Chicago State in the Steve Nimocks Redhawk Invitational. North Dakota was led by Reagan McIntosh, a junior setter who finished the weekend leading the team with 104 assists and 23 digs while adding five kills, three blocks, and two service aces. She recorded 52 assists and 10 digs in their Saturday matchup against Seattle U and had a .571 hitting percentage in that match as well. Another standout player for the Fighting Hawks was junior right side hitter An den Hamer, who tallied a team-leading 29 kills with a .383 hitting percentage. She recorded a career-high 17 kills during Saturday's match while adding eight digs and a block.

North Dakota came into the season after finishing 7-20 last year and is predicted to finish sixth in the Summit League this season. The Fighting Hawks had two players who were nominated to the conference's watchlist with Hamer being the first and Lauren Perugini, a senior outside hitter, being the other. Perugini had a challenging first weekend, notching 13 kills with three assists, 10 digs, and a block while hitting .067.