Creighton Volleyball Clinches BIG EAST Tourney Bid With Win at Xavier
CINCINNATI, Ohio -- The Creighton Volleyball team clinched a bid in the 2026 BIG EAST Championship Presented by JEEP with a 3-0 win at Xavier on Saturday afternoon. Scores in favor of the Bluejays were 25-14, 25-15, 25-17.
Creighton (16-9, 11-2 BIG EAST) moved back into a tie atop the league standings with Marquette, which visits Georgetown this evening. Xavier, which entered the day in a three-way tie for third place in the BIG EAST, dropped to 15-10 overall and is 8-6 in league action.
The first set was an Ayden Ames highlight reel as the junior middle blocker had three kills, a solo block and an ace to help CU race to a 15-11 lead at the technical timeout. After a CU serving error coming out of the break, Cincinnati native Sydney Breissinger compiled a 7-0 run behind the line to expand the lead to 22-12. A setter dump from Katie Dalton closed out a commanding 25-14 victory that saw CU hit .371 with Dalton contributing 10 assists, three kills and three digs. Four Bluejays had three or more kills in the opener, and Saige Damrow had five digs to spearhead a defense that held Xavier to -.032 hitting.
Trinity Shadd-Ceres caught fire in the second with four early kills. An ace by Damrow pushed the Bluejay advantage to 10-4, forcing a Xavier timeout. Three Musketeer points halved the deficit before the Bluejays embarked on a 6-0 run to take a 16-7 edge. The domination continued as CU finished off a 25-15 victory to take a 2-0 lead into intermission. Shadd-Ceres had seven kills in the second set alone to highlight an offense that hit .341.
Creighton scored the first four points of the third set and never trailed while blitzing to a 10-4 edge. Xavier drew within three points at 15-12 before Abbey Hayes unleashed a 3-0 service run to return the lead to six and the Jays cruised from there to win its 21st set from Xavier in its last 22 tries.
Shadd-Ceres had her sixth straight match with double-figure kills, finishing with 16, and Columbus, Ohio, native Eloise Brandewie had 11 kills to lead Creighton. Ames hit a team-high .600 with nine kills in 15 errorless swings, also adding a match-high four blocks. Hayes and Damrow both had 14 digs and Breissinger contributed 13 for a Bluejay team that hit .350 and finished with 52 kills, 61 digs, five blocks and three aces.
Charlotte Moriarty topped Xavier with 10 kills, and Margo Kemp added eight. Kelsey Niesen dug a match-best 21 balls. The Musketeers finished with 27 kills, 51 digs, four blocks and two aces while hitting .114.
The Bluejays play their final regular-season road contest of the season on Sunday at Noon Central at Butler in a match that will air on ESPN+.