A crowd of 1,216 witnessed a black and blue contest, in more than just the jersey color.

Double-doubles from Katie Hughes and Michaela Mestl as well as six blocks from Alex Opperman powered No. 11 Wayne State College in a 19-25, 26-24, 25-22 and 25-16 victory in Northern Sun Conference volleyball action Tuesday evening at Rice Auditorium in Wayne on Black Out/Pack The House Night.

The crowd of 1,216 was the fourth-largest single attendance mark in school history. The Wildcats are now 21-4 overall and 13-3 in the NSIC while the Vikings fall to 15-9 overall and 8-8 in conference play.

The first set was controlled early by Wayne State, but Augustana rallied from an 8-5 deficit and took the lead for good at 10-9 as the Vikings pulled away for a 25-19 set win. Augustana forced a match-high seven attack errors on the Wildcats in the first set.

The second set was tightly contested with 15 ties and eight lead changes. With the score tied at 24-24, WSC got kills from Elizabeth Gebhardt and Mestl to win the set 26-24.

Augustana jumped out quickly in the third set, taking a 9-4 lead on the Wildcats. WSC regained the momentum by scoring five straight points to even the set at 9-9 followed by a streak of four straight points, all on Viking attack or service errors, to give WSC a 14-10 lead that the Wildcats would never relinquish in taking a 25-22 set win.

The fourth set was close early on, but WSC used four straight points to erase an early Augustana lead and WSC pulled away for a 25-16 win to finish with a 3-1 match victory over the Vikings.

Wayne State hit .188 in the match with Augustana recording a .172 attack percentage. The contest featured numerous lengthy rallies, producing 101 digs for the Vikings and 100 by the Wildcats.

WSC had seven more kills than the Vikings, 58-51, while Augustana had one more block than the Wildcats, 10-9. The Wildcats had five service aces and six errors while Augustana had eight aces and 10 service errors.

Gebhardt and Hughes had 15 kills apiece while Mestl recorded a season-high 14 kills. Mestl added 38 digs, tied for the fifth-most in single game by a Wildcat player, for her second double-double of the season while Hughes finished with 13 digs to account for her 14th double-double of the year.

The Wildcats also played well over the weekend, sweeping Upper Iowa and defeating Winona State 3-1.

The Wildcats will be on the road this weekend, playing at No. 2 Minnesota Duluth Friday at 7 p.m. and St. Cloud State Saturday in a 4 p.m. contest.

Information courtesy Sports Information.