A crowd of just over a thousand spectators was reduced to slack-jawed amazement at McKale Center by the performance turned in by a scrappy team from Southern Virginia.
That team, the Radford Highlanders, punched their way past the mighty Arizona Wildcats, storming back from an early two sets to none deficit to win the Cactus Classic in five stanzas.
Radford, hailing from a town with slightly more residents (17,403) than a full house at McKale (14,545), waged an outright assault on the soft underbelly of the Wildcats’ attack, hitting perfectly-timed volleys that were consistently just out of reach of diving Arizona players.