The road to the Region XIV Conference volleyball championship and the No. 1 seed in the upcoming regional tournament now clearly leads through The Valley.

The No. 12 Cardinals made sure of that Tuesday night at Cardinal Gym with a 3-0 win against No. 7 Blinn.  In convincing fashion, the Cardinals won 25-17, 25-18, 25-18.

So, what does it all mean?

With five games left on the schedule, the Cardinals now lead Blinn by two games in the loss column. The Cardinals, 21-6 on the season, are 9-0 in conference. Blinn, 33-2, both losses to the Cardinals, is 10-2 in league play.

"I am happy with the way we performed tonight," said first-year Cardinal head coach Paty Figueiredo. "We knew we had not played to our potential in Missouri last weekend. I was pleased to see us bounce back tonight."

Blinn took a 1-0 lead to start the first set. After that, it was all Cardinals all night long. The dynamite went boom.

The win was "team effort" according to Figueiredo.

"That is how we like it," Figueiredo said. "Our preference is for there to not be one or two leading they way. We are better when we play as a team."

That said, Bianca Salvador, Chloe Tuiasosopo, Meleksu Ozmen, Tamara Bojanic, Lorena Bonato, Vitoria Gasparini, Bruna Nunes, Zorana Stankovska and Anastasiia Nedeilko made their coach very happy then.

The Cardinals are at home again Friday against Lee College. Match time is 6 p.m.