This week: Notre Dame College volleyball will travel to play Urbana University on September 25 at 6 p.m., Shepherd University at 7 p.m. on September 28 and on September 29, they will play Fairmont State University at 1 p.m.

Records: The Falcons have a record of 6-8 this season and 0-1 in the Mountain East Conference while Urbana is 11-6, overall, and 0-2 in the MEC. Shepherd is 10-5 (0-2 MEC) and Fairmont State sits at 4-9, 0-2 MEC.

Coaches Corner: Travis Hinkle is in his first season at Notre Dame. Kara Hellmann is also in her first season at Urbana. Alex Hoekstra is now in his fourth season at Shepherd and coached the team to a record of 23-7 (11-4 MEC) in 2017. Courtney Materazzi is now in her fifth season as head coach of Fairmont State and holds a record of 95-49 (49-17 MEC).

Rankings: None of the teams are ranked in the AVCA Coaches Poll.

Series History: The Falcons are 2-13 against Urbana University since 2011, 3-8 against Shepherd since 2012 and 1-13 versus Fairmont State since 2011.

Noting the Falcons: Notre Dame played one game last week and it was a very close contest with West Liberty. In the Falcons' first conference matchup, NDC took the first and third set, but WLU prevailed 3-2 with the final two sets being decided by a combined six points. Mary Kate McHugh led the team with 16 kills and 10 digs. McHugh has 197 kills this season with 213 points and 153 digs. She leads the conference with 4.19 kills-per-set and is 16th in the country in that stat. Erin Daugherty had 12 kills, a hit percentage of .435 and eight blocks. She is second on the team with 110 points and leads the team with 26 blocks. The Falcons had four players with double-digit digs against the Hilltoppers. Alexandria Kaeberlein led the team with 22 digs. She leads the squad with 332 digs and is third in the conference in that stat. Kaeberlein is also 10th in NCAA Division II with 6.51 digs-per-set. Paige Staudacher has 485 assists this season and against West Liberty, she became just the fourth player in program history to record over 2000 assists. She is now second in the conference with 9.51 assists-per-set. As a team, NDC is second in the Mountain East Conference with 19.43 digs-per-set.

Noting the Blue Knights: Urbana played West Liberty and Wheeling Jesuit at home, last week. They lost on Friday to the Hilltoppers 3-2 and then fell 3-1 to WJU on Saturday. In the first game of the weekend, although West Liberty had a hit percentage of 25.1-percent, UU kept the game close. The Blue Knights lost in five sets, but Madison Davis led the team with 27 digs, had an attack percentage of .460 and recorded 27.5 points. Anna Davis had 34 digs and Deandra Atwood had 20 digs. The Blue Knights took Wheeling Jesuit to four games, beating WJU in a set, which has only happened twice this season in conference play. In the match, Davis had 15 kills and a hit percentage of .283. Atwood set up 28 assists while Courtney Niesen, who has a team-high 395 digs this year, recorded 30 digs on the other side of the ball. Davis leads the team with 228 digs, but her teammate is close behind as Hannah Delor currently has 215. Those two (Davis and Delor) are two and three in the conference in total digs. Davis also leads the squad with 37 blocks. Atwood has 373 assists, while Davis has 346. Niesen is first in the MEC with 395 total digs. Niesen (28) and Delor (26) are both in the top-15 in the country in aces.

Noting the Rams: Shepherd played one game last week, against Thomas Jefferson University. In a fairly close contest, Shepherd won 3-1, but had a lesser hit percentage than TJU (.209-.191). Peyton Lindblad led the team with 17 kills and Becca Kern added 42 assists. Alex Farnsworth, Kern and Lindblad all had two aces. Seone Goode added 25 digs. This season, Shepherd has a .190 hit percentage, on average. Lindblad leads the team with 193 kills and has 4.11 kills-per-set and Kern has 385 assists on the season. Defensively, Imani Major has 270 digs and Georgia Ohmke is averaging over a block-per-game and has a total of 50. The Rams are third in the Mountain East Conference at 12.25 kills-per-set. SU also averages two aces-per-set which is the best in the conference.
 
Noting the Fighting Falcons:  Fairmont State fell to Seton Hill University 3-0 in their lone game of the week. Seton Hill had a hit percentage of 25.7-percent to FSU's 13.7-percent. The Fighting Falcons scored just 12 points in the second set. Yvonne Fullerton finished with 10 kills, Lily Keber added 17 assists and Emma Mobley had 14 digs. Fairmont State has struggled in the second set this entire year, as they have been outscored by a total of 302-238 in that set. However, if they get to the fourth set, they have outscored opponents 116-104. Mobley has 104 kills and the next highest on the team is 82. She also leads the team with 156 digs, but her teammate Julia DiPaola is close behind with 153. Lily Keber has 204 assists this season while Kelsey Moeller has 20 aces. Rebecca Feeney has 39 total blocks. Fairmont State blocks two shots-per-set, on average, which is third best in the MEC.