Box Score It took a while -- two hours and five minutes to be precise -- but Hamline's four volleyball seniors will remember their last night of competition at Hutton Arena with a big smile.

The Pipers ended 2014 with a gritty 3-2 victory over St. Catherine on Halloween Night. HU saved their best hitting for the deciding set to finish with a winning record for the second year in a row under head coach Becky Egan. Hamline finished 13-10 overall, 5-6 in the MIAC. They missed out on a return to the playoffs by one win.

HU's seniors saw a lot of court time in this one. Lynsey Reimer patrolled the back line with her usual aplomb. She finished with 26 digs -- the fourth time this year she had hit that number. That gave her 1717 for her career, third best in Hamline history. Her 5.10 digs per set is a careeer best for any HU player. Up front, Stephanie Kaup had several big hits en route to a 12 kill, 391 hitting percentage effort, the best all season by any Piper with 12 or more kills in a match. Paige Walters made the most of her start with seven kills and Caitlyn Gottwald, who led the Pipers in kills this year with 152, added six. 

But it was a hard, long night  for both teams. The teams traded leads back and forth in the opener and each ducked a set point before HU prevailed, 26-24. The second set was a tight one, too. There were seven ties along the way before the Pipers finally managed a 27-25 victory.

SCU made sure that didn't happened in the next set. The Wildcats bolted to a 9-0 lead. HU was able to cut it to four but that was close as they could get in a 25-16 loss. The fourth set was the tightest of the night with 16 ties and seven lead changes. The Wildcats, however, had the last word with a 25-23 win to force one more set.

This time, Hamline took the early edge by winning the first two points. SCU got back within a point on two occasions -- the second of which came at 10-9. HU then took five of the next seven points to gain the win. Appropriately, Gabriella Feldt, who was strong all night had the last kill. Feldt and Jena Meyer shared top honors with 14 kills apiece. HU, which hit .138 for the night, upped its game in the deciding set with a .274 hitting percentage. Hamline's 60 kills on the night is a season high.

As has been the case all season, Vassi Prattas and Amelia Jensen did the lion's share of the setup work with 25 and 23 assists respectively. In addition to Reimer's big night, Michelle Mattke had 11 digs and Prattas added 10. 

It all added up to ending the season the way it began -- with a win.