By: Evan O'Kelly, Associate Commissioner for Communications

PORTLAND, Ore. – 15-0.
 
It was unlike anything that Simon Fraser volleyball head coach Gina Schmidt had ever seen. “I played in the old school scoring era – I don’t think I have ever seen that in my time as a player or coach,” Schimdt said, referring to the final score in the fifth set of her team’s upset of No. 4 San Francisco State on Friday in Bellingham, Wash.
 
The blanking was improbable for a plethora of reasons. It came against the reigning national runner-up and a top-5 ranked team in the nation, not to mention it seems downright impossible for a match to be decided in such fashion after each team won two sets.
 
It marked the first time in the 25-year history of the Great Northwest Athletic Conference that a team achieved a shutout in a fifth set. In fact, it marked just the 10th time a GNAC team allowed its opponent fewer than five points in a decisive frame. Wins of 15-2 by Northwest Nazarene over Concordia (Ore.) on Oct. 2, 2015 and Alaska Anchorage over Central Washington on Nov. 13, 2008 previously stood as the fewest points surrendered by a GNAC team in a single set. The last time a conference school allowed fewer than five points in a set was a 15-3 win by Seattle Pacific over Montana State Billings on Sept. 20, 2018.
 

Lowest Fifth-Set Opponent Scores, GNAC Volleyball History
Date	School	Score	Opponent
9/5/2025	Simon Fraser	15-0	#4 San Francisco State
11/13/2008	Alaska Anchorage	15-2	Central Washington
10/2/2015	Northwest Nazarene	15-2	Concordia
10/19/2013	Western Oregon	15-3	Montana State Billings
9/11/2015	Alaska Anchorage	15-3	#21 BYU Hawaii
9/9/2016	Simon Fraser	15-3	Fresno Pacific
9/9/2017	Western Oregon	15-3	Fresno Pacific
9/20/2018	Seattle Pacific	15-3	Montana State Billings
11/10/2005	Western Washington	15-4	Alaska
9/13/2013	Seattle Pacific	15-4	Cal State Los Angeles
A rare occurrence, a GNAC team has held its opponent to fewer than five points in a set on just 10 occasions. On Friday, SFU was the first-ever to record a fifth-set shutout.

The remarkable run was the headline among as good a performance as the Red Leafs could have hoped for to open the 2025 campaign. SFU (3-0) had its first-ever season-opening home match against an NCAA opponent on Thursday evening, when it knocked off No. 3 St. Cloud State in consecutive sets. Then after toppling the Gators on Friday, SFU avenged last year’s NCAA West Region Championships defeat with a five-set victory over No. 11 Cal Poly Pomona. Three wins over three nationally ranked opponents earned the Red Leafs, who received votes in the American Volleyball Coaches Association preseason top-25 poll, the GNAC Team of the Week award.
 
“We have a tough preseason schedule,” said Schmidt, who begins her 13th season as the fifth-winningest coach in GNAC history at 127-84 (.602) overall and 174-120 (.592) in league play. “We have a lot of returners, so I wouldn’t have scheduled like that if I didn’t think we had the team to handle that. It was great to see all the work we put in over the spring show up here early in the season.”
 
One of those key returners Schmidt alluded to is junior libero Macyn Unger, who was at the service line for nearly the entirety of the fifth set against San Francisco State. After the Gators had the first serve of the decisive frame – which ended in a kill off the hand of SFU’s Natalie Lemoine-Sells – Unger took it from there and served the next 14 points to complete the victory. “After I made the first couple serves, I felt like I could probably keep it going,” said Unger, who matched her career high with four aces in the match. “Every time I went back to serve again, I really just tried to focus on my serving target.”
 
The streak of 14 consecutive points featured just three service aces, as SFU combined a steady attack, strong net play and a bit of flat-out luck on the way to the shutout. “Sometimes there is a little bit of luck with the way the ball bounces, and kudos to Macyn for being able to serve 14 in a row to get us through that set,” Schmidt said. “We made them try to earn their points, did a good job with our blocking defense and found a way. It was pretty special – I haven’t seen that before.”
 
Incredibly, it wasn’t the only double-digit streak of serves by a player in the match. Trailing 18-12 in the opening set, it was once again a kill by Lemoine-Sells – who averaged 3.38 kills per set among a stellar opening-week performance – that kicked off an improbable set-ending rally. That time it was SFU sophomore Ella McVitte who toed the line for a run of 12 consecutive serves, featuring four of her career-high six aces as the Red Leafs stunned their opponent 25-18.
 
Amid the serving excellence against SFSU, there was one other factor that fueled the win for the Red Leafs. Sophomore middle blocker Logan Remington broke the GNAC record for total blocks in a match, finishing with 18 to blow away the previous conference mark of 14. “She was the difference in that SF State game,” Schmidt said on Remington, who was named GNAC Defensive Player of the Week earlier on Monday. “She was a force at the net and as a middle, and this honor was well deserved based on her performance over all three matches. Logan was a consistent presence at the net, and it was energizing for the team every time she would get a big block.”
 
Remington averaged 2.54 blocks per set overall across the three matches – the highest figure of any player in NCAA Division II volleyball on opening weekend. Unger meanwhile averaged 4.54 digs per set, her 59 total being the most of any GNAC player in last week’s matches. Lemoine-Sells led the offense with 3.38 kills per set on a .283 attack percentage while Megan Hawkins chipped in 2.85 kills per set and returning first-team all-GNAC hitter Davida Hill added 2.44 kills per set. Senior setter Eva Person facilitated the offense with 6.92 assists per set and contributed at the net with 0.92 blocks per set next to Remington.
 
 
Lemoine-Sells and Hill were the stars of the show in the sweep of St. Cloud State, posting 12 kills on .417 hitting and 10 kills on .364 hitting, respectively in the season opener. “That was the first time we have ever played an NCAA team at home in our first match of the season,” said Schmidt, whose team’s last opening match at home was against Columbia Bible on Sept. 4, 2014. “It was unique – we had a good crowd and our team was excited about that. Our team came together and everybody did their jobs. The focus was on our side and playing the way we knew we were capable of playing.”
 
In addition to Remington’s standout game defensively against the Gators, Lemoine-Sells led the team with 18 kills while Hawkins added a 15-kill, 13-dig double-double and Hill had a 12-kill, 18-dig double-double. It marked the highest-ranked teams that SFU defeated since it joined the conference in 2010.
 
Perhaps the most exciting moment of the weekend came in the finale against the 11th-ranked Broncos, who rallied to overcome a 2-0 deficit and force yet another decisive fifth set on Saturday. This time, SFU found a way to win despite its back against the wall down 10-7 and then again 13-11. The Red Leafs rattled off the next three points in both instances, before a pair of errors by the Broncos ultimately ended the match with an 18-16 set triumph for SFU.
   
“All weekend it was a full team effort every match,” said Schmidt, who watched sophomore Jayden Armstrong – who never had more than five kills in a collegiate match – lead her team with 16 against CPP. “This one was the epitome of that. Everyone who came in made key plays at pivotal times. That is a quality team – our last match last season was 5-setter against them. It wasn’t easy to get kills against them, but we did a good job of staying patient and finding ways. There are a lot of ways to win a match, and we found a way to be two points better in the end.”
 
It was an inspirational start to a season bearing high hopes for the Red Leafs, who were picked second and received a first-place vote in the GNAC preseason coaches poll released on Aug. 19. SFU tied for second in last year’s GNAC volleyball standings, going 17-9 overall, 13-5 in league play and advancing to the NCAA tournament for the third time.
 
The journey continues this week for SFU, which didn’t skip a beat on opening weekend despite losing 2024 GNAC Player of the Year Brooke Dexter to graduation. The Red Leafs, who are a virtual lock to crack the top-25 when the AVCA releases its new rankings Tuesday, head south to face RV Cal State LA, a rematch against No. 11 CPP and No. 23 Colorado Mesa in another spotlight weekend at the Cal State LA Invitational.