UA head coach David Rubio said all week that Arizona's match against in-state rival ASU Saturday would be a lot closer than the two teams' records indicate. He was right.

The UA women's volleyball team played down to the Sun Devils' level, but the Wildcats' effort was still good enough to pull out a 3-1 (30-28, 30-25, 33-35, 32-30) victory Saturday in Tempe.

The No. 4 Wildcats (16-3 overall, 11-3 Pacific 10 Conference) recorded their school-record eighth consecutive Pac-10 victory over the Sun Devils (7-13, 2-10 Pac-10), who are now 0-8 against ranked opponents this season.

"I expected a close match," Rubio said. "ASU always plays well against us. I knew we would have a slight letdown after last weekend's matches. I am happy though that we were able to come out with the victory."

The Wildcats have now won nine out of their last 10 matches against the Sun Devils.

"Every time we play ASU, it is a tight match," junior outside hitter Shannon Torregrosa said. "We were ready for a tough match from the start. We did not play as well as we did versus USC and UCLA, but it is only one match and the important thing is that we got the victory.

UA was led by its outside hitters, junior Lisa Rutledge and senior Jill Talbot.

Rutledge recorded her fifth double-double of the season with a match-high 22 kills and a career-high 25 digs in UA's victory.

Rutledge had 65 total swings, which was 17 more then Torregrosa, who usually tops Wildcat attackers in that category.

"We try to set both Lisa and Shannon as much as possible," Rubio said. "It really depends though on the complexity of the match and the way it unfolds. When one is on we try to set that one as much as possible and that was the case with Lisa (Saturday)."

Talbot added 16 kills and 19 digs as well.

One bright spot for the Sun Devils was the play of sophomore outside hitter Kim Mehlhorn, who finished the match with a career-high 19 kills. It marked the ninth consecutive game that the sophomore has accumulated double-digits in kills.

Senior setter Lauren Benward said that the team was fatigued after the tough stretch of matches they have had in the past two weeks.

"We were tired against ASU," Benward said. "(Rubio) predicted that it would be a hard match for us to get up for and he was right. We all struggled at times, but we came together as a team to pull out the victory."

Rubio said the Wildcats must now get healthy heading into the season's final stretch.

"The big thing we need to do is rest," Rubio said. "We have a big weekend against the Washington schools and we have to be ready. We need to be well rested and continue to work on our consistency and we will be fine."