The Dominican University women’s volleyball team upended the Benedictine University Eagles 3-0 (25-23, 25-19, 25-22) on Saturday night to clinch the Northern Athletics Conference (NAC) Tournament Championship and secure the program’s first bid to the NCAA Division III Women’s Volleyball Championship.

The Benedictine University Eagles were all over the Stars in the opening set, racing out to a 10-4 lead before senior Darcy Kammeier (Kirkwood, Mo.) ignited 6-2 run for the Stars with one of her five kills in the first set. Benedictine regrouped and remained in the lead, leading 20-23 before committing five errors to hand the Stars the set 25-23.

In the second set, back-to-back kills by sophomore setter Jessica Guerrieri (Plainfield, Ill.) put the Stars ahead 7-6 before a pair of Eagles’ errors force Benedictine head coach Jennifer Wildes to call a timeout with the Stars ahead 10-7. Benedictine rallied to pull within a point at 14-13, but a 5-1 run for the Stars capped by a Becca Fritz (Mount Carroll, Ill.) service ace put the set out of reach.

Smelling victory, the Stars came out with a flurry in set three, taking a 14-8 lead on a kill by Kammeier and forcing an Eagle timeout. Benedictine pulled within three at 20-17 on a kill by Candace Cuppini, one of her match-high 14 kills on the night. A pair of kills by freshman Claire Dezelski (Northville, Mich.) and a pair of Eagle errors had the Stars ahead 24-19 to set up a thrilling finish. The Eagles rallied back to within 24-22 with kills by Cuppini and Brooke Bowman but it was a Kayla Leyden hitting error, one of 26 attack errors for the Eagles on the night, that handed the Stars the championship.

Dezelski paced the Stars with a team-high 12 kills on 38 attacks while committing just three errors. Kammeier added nine kills while fellow senior Kasey Kiepura (Vernon Hills, Ill.) chipped in eight kills.

Guerrieri logged her second double-double of the NAC Tournament with a 31-assist, 10-dig performance while Liz Yakey (Sun Prairie, Wis.) tallied a match-high 20 digs.

The Stars, now 26-9 on the season, will find out Monday the details of their inaugural trip to the NCAA Division III Women’s Volleyball Championship when the tournament brackets are released at 10:00 a.m. on a selection show streamed live over the NCAA.com website.

Since joining the NCAA Division III ranks in 2000, the Stars had been within a match of the NCAA national tournament in both 2003 and 2009. In 2003, the Stars, then competing in the Northern Illinois-Iowa Conference, coasted undefeated into the championship round of the double-elimination tournament before suffering back-to-back losses to Rockford College. Last year the Stars had a two-set lead over the Lakeland College Muskies in the NAC Tournament Championship, before falling in five sets to the defending NAC Champs.