DE PERE - St. Norbert College capped a 4-0 opening weekend with a pair of victories over Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference foes on the second day of the Chick-fil-A Invitational at Mulva Family Fitness & Sports Center.

The Green Knights, who are off to their best start since 2012, topped The College of St. Scholastica and Hamline University both by 3-1 scores. St. Norbert survived a pair of deuce sets to top the Saints 27-25, 30-28, 20-25, 25-19 and followed with a 25-20, 19-25, 25-16, 25-9 triumph over the Pipers.

The match against St. Scholastica featured a whopping 41 tied scores and 18 lead changes. St. Norbert led for much of Set 1 before falling behind late at 21-19. The Saints held a 23-22 lead before the host rebounded for a 25-24 edge. After a 25-25 deadlock, a pair of St. Scholastica hitting errors put the Green Knights ahead 1-0. In Set 2, the Green Knights had set points at 24-23 and 25-24 before the Saints came back for match points of their own 26-25 and 27-26. Following a 28-28 tie, a Casey Vaughan kill and a Saints' hitting error put St. Norbert ahead 2-0. The Saints cut their deficit to 2-1 after leading for all but the opening stages of the stanza. The fourth set had eight lead changes and 15 ties, the last one coming at 19-19. A pair of Mari Szews (pictured) kills keyed an impressive 6-0 run to close out the match win.

The Green Knights hit .160, with 61 kills against 27 errors in 213 attempts. Vaughan had 15 kills, while Szews added 12 kills. Heidi Colburn had 41 assists, while Maddie Kitowski had two service aces. St. Norbert totaled 115 digs, with 26 coming from Claire Leynse. Kara Sowinski added 19 digs, Vaughan 17 and Colburn 13. Szews had six blocks, while Vaughan had four. Alli Clark posted three blocks, while Colburn, Kirsten Clatt and Mickenzi Benter all had two apiece.

Against Hamline, St. Norbert trailed 18-16 in the opening set before snapping a 20-20 tie with a 5-0 run to take an early 1-0 lead. The Green Knights never led in Set 2 as the Pipers leveled the match at 1-1. The third set saw St. Norbert in arrears 7-5 before it went on a 9-4 run to take a 14-11 lead. The Pipers got back to within 14-13 before a 10-1 St. Norbert run put it in control. St. Norbert sprinted out to a 17-3 lead in Set 4 en route to sewing up the win.

St. Norbert hit .222 in the match, with 49 kills and 17 errors in 144 swings. Benter had 13 kills, while Anna Kudick added 10 terminations. Szews had nine kills to cap a strong weekend which saw her named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player at the conclusion of the event. Colburn had 33 assists. Andrianna Volz and Annabel Stevenson had two service aces apiece. Stevenson added 16 digs, while Sowinski added 14 digs and Leynse 12. Klatt had five blocks, while Szews and Benter had three apiece.