MANHATTAN, Kan. After sweeping each of its Varney’s Kansas State Invitational opponents, No. 22 Kansas State earned the tournament title Saturday with a 3-0 defeat of Fresno State. The Wildcats claimed the win with scores of 30-9, 30-19, 30-17 and improves to 8-2 on the season.

Contributing in various roles was senior Stacey Spiegelberg, who tallied a match-high 36 assists. The Overland Park, Kan., native added six digs, three service aces and four block assists.

Defensively, the Cats had five members tally five or more digs with nine from each Angie Lastra and Lauren Rosenthal. Along with Spiegelberg, sophomore Kelsey Chipman and junior Megan Farr also knocked down four block assists.

Jenny Jantsch led in kills with 10 and also notched three service aces including two-consecutive during game three. Rita Liliom added nine kills and four Cats (Chipman, JuliAnne Chisholm, Farr and Nataly Korobkova) each had seven. Chisholm’s seven kills becomes a new career high for the freshman who also had a four-dig and one-service ace effort.

K-State came out to dominate the Bulldogs in game one and held its opponent to single-digit points, marking only the fourth time in school history and second time in the 2007 season since the introduction of rally scoring in 2001. The Wildcats had 19 kills, no errors and 28 attempts for .679 hitting during game one, becoming K-State’s best hitting in a match during this season. Liliom had five kills on five attempts during the 30-9 game one over Fresno State.

The Cats came out with five-unanswered points during the second game, as Chipman aided with two kills in that span. The Bulldogs were prevented from creating a point run until being down 19-10 when Fresno State had three-consecutive points. Four kills from each Chisholm and Korobkova gave the Cats the second game 30-19

The third game featured the only tie score during the match at 1-all. After earning a lead, K-State controlled the points and kept a spread of four or more points for much of the final game. Bulldog errors and .069 hitting allowed the Wildcats to win the match with the final game of 30-17. Jantsch led in the game, tallying five of her 10 kills in the third alone.

The win gives the Cats their second tournament title of the year when pairing the Varney’s trophy with the Best Western Shocker Classic title from Wichita, Kan. At 8-2, K-State will enter conference season on Wednesday with an identical record to the 2006 year. The Big 12 season for K-State will open in Lawrence, Kan., on Wed., Sept. 12^th, against rival Kansas. For complete coverage, please visit www.kstatesports.com.