After a tightly contested first set, top seeded Creighton took care of business in the next three frames to defeat #4 seed Xavier, 3-1, in the first of two Big East tournament semifinal matches.
Creighton advances to Saturday's championship match for their second appearance in the title game in as many years in the Big East. The Bluejays defeated Xavier in the 2013 semifinals as well, also by a final score of 3-1.
After a first set that Xavier won, 28-26, Creighton dominated the next two sets, winning both 25-18. Those sets were more competitive than Xavier had been in the regular season against the Jays, where they had failed to break the 17 point barrier on four out of seven frames. When you're trying to pull an upset and extend your season, you can't afford to make mistakes, and that's what Xavier did, committing 25 errors while hitting just .195 against a strong .271 for Creighton.
Three Bluejays struck into double digits in kills, led by 13 from freshman middle blocker Marysa Wilkinson. Jess Bird had a double-double with 10 kills and 11 digs, as did setter Maggie Baumert, who combined 40 assists and 13 digs. The Jays couldn't contain Abbey Bessler, who had a match high 20 kills while hitting .326. Freshman libero Jesse Earl had a match high 21 digs for the Musketeer defense, who also got at least four digs from six different players.