The High Point University volleyball team had a day of firsts on Sunday as the Panthers earned a 3-0 (30-24, 30-25, 30-16) sweep over Birmingham-Southern in Big South Conference play.

For HPU, the win marked their first this season at home snapping a 0-5 start at the Millis Center. It also represented their first victory over Birmingham-Southern since 2002 halting a nine-match losing skid. High Point is now 5-13 overall and 3-2 in the conference while Birmingham-Southern slips to 5-13 overall and 2-3 in league action.

High Point used a balanced attack from the opening serve to earn the victory. For the match, HPU led in nearly every statistical category including a .312 hitting percentage, their second best performance of the season. The purple Panthers finished with 59 kills to just 38 for the black and gold Panthers and also led 79-66 in digs.

The outside hitter tandem of junior Jamie Kaufman and freshman Audie Gonzalez were the keys in the win as both players finished the match with a double-double. Kaufman led with 20 kills and also had 15 digs while Gonzalez tallied 19 kills and a team-best 26 digs. Libero Lauren Hatch added a 17 dig, three ace effort while sophomore setter Kristina Taylor dished out 42 assists.

Sarah Harris paced the BSC attack notching 10 kills while libero Alex Norten topped a trio of Panther defenders in double-digits with 29 digs.

"This is the first time we have defeated Birmingham in my tenure," said HPU head coach Chad Esposito. "I am very proud of our effort and consistency. That is something we have worked on all year and we did a great job of it today. I thought our defense really set the tone for the match and allowed us to do a variety of things on offense. It is always nice to get a conference win, especially at home as we head down the stretch."

Game one saw the pair of Panthers swap the lead six times and share the lead 14. With the game knotted at 22, High Point tallied five straight points on Lindsay Raus' serve and then closed out the game by a 30-24 count.

The two squads again battled back-and-forth early in the second stanza. HPU seized the momentum midway through the game using a 12-5 surge after BSC tied the score at 10. Birmingham rallied to trim the deficit to a pair of points at, 23-21, but Kaufman sparked High Point from the service line with three consecutive scores to put the game away.

Hatch served for six straight points early putting High Point ahead and Gonzalez strung together six points on her serve late as HPU cruised to the win in the deciding third frame.

High Point next steps out of conference playing at long-time rival Elon on Wednesday at 7 p.m. The Panthers return home next weekend for a pair of conference matches with Radford (Friday) and Liberty (Saturday).