In another competitive battle with Saint Xavier, St. Ambrose came up a little short. The Bees, who already earned an NAIA National Championship Opening Round bid, fell to the Cougars in the CCAC Tournament championship match 17-25, 25-23, 25-12, 25-23 Saturday afternoon in Chicago.

The Bees, who will learn their first-round opponent on Monday, will enter Nationals with a 24-9 record. They settled for tournament runner-up honors to match their second-place regular-season finish. It marked the highest CCAC women's volleyball finish for St. Ambrose since joining the conference in 2015.

SAU won the opening set but couldn't do enough down the stretch of the second and fourth sets. 

In the second, St. Ambrose led 22-21 on a Mackenzie Grafton kill, but would only get one more point the rest of the set, that coming on a Payton Wendt kill that knotted the score at 23-23. After surrendering an 11-point run midway through the third, the Bees came back strong late in the fourth. Down 19-12, SAU ripped off a 10-1 run. Grafton, Meredith Umland, Jill Kavalauskas and Macy Watkins had kills as part of the spurt that put the Bees in front 22-20. But Saint Xavier (23-8) ran off four straight points. A Kavalauskas kill erased one match point before the Cougars claimed the conference crown.

Grafton led SAU with 11 kills. Kavalauskas had nine, and Meredith Siebers and Umland each picked up five.

Watkins led the Bees with 23 assists. Hannah Sondag was credited with 11. Maicee Pierce had a team-high 13 digs in the loss.

St. Ambrose will next make its first appearance at Nationals since 2010. The NAIA women's volleyball selection show is scheduled for Monday at 10 a.m. on the NAIA YouTube channel.