BOX SCORE

MARSHALL, Minn. – No. 1 seed Southwest Minnesota State was knocked out of the NCAA Tournament tonight by No. 4 seed Nebraska-Kearney. The Mustangs fell in four sets to the Lopers by scores of 22-25, 19-25, 28-26 and 17-25 and finish the season 27-4 overall while Nebraska-Kearney improves to 31-4.

Kearney moves on to the Central Region championship game where they will take on No. 2 seed Concordia University, St. Paul tomorrow night at 7 p.m. in Marshall.

Brooke Burmeister led all players with 22 kills in the match. Devin Diedrich finished with 17 kills while Mary Groth also pitched in with 15 kills of her own. Nebraska-Kearney came in with the plan to take away Diedrich and Groth in the middle. The Lopers finished with 12 teams blocks.

Ellie Pesavento finished the match with seven block assists and Ariel Krolikowski tallied six. Seven Lopers picked up block assists in the match.

Southwest Minnesota State started out slow falling in the first two sets to Nebraska-Kearney. The Mustangs turned that around early in the third set jumping out to an early 5-1 lead.

SMSU held a 15-8 lead over UNK. The Lopers would not go away trying to finish the Mustangs in three sets. Nebraska-Kearney had the Mustangs on the ropes twice, just one point away from putting the match away.

Cara Carson finished with a match-high 53 set assists, finishing the season with 1,412. Four Mustangs recorded double-digits in digs, led by Carson who picked up a career-high 17. Freshman Rachel Westby and Brittany Wenzel both ended the night with 12 digs each. Westby added seven kills and one service ace on the night.

The crowd roared as the Mustangs came up with one desperation dig after another. The Mustangs would need extra points, but eventually won the third set 28-26.

Southwest Minnesota State needed five sets to win last night, and have won six of seven matches that have gone to five sets, but the magic wasn't in the cards for SMSU tonight.UNK went on four and three-point runs early in the fourth set which helped them jump out to a 9-3 lead over SMSU.

The Mustangs couldn't recover and found themselves chasing the Lopers the entire fourth set. SMSU would eventually fall in the final set by a score of 25-17. This was just the second loss for SMSU in a four-set match.

SMSU ends its season 27-4 overall and suffered its first home loss in 13 matches this season. The Mustangs played the match without head coach Terry Culhane, who suffered a heart attack on Friday morning and was air-lifted to Sioux Falls, S.D., and is currently in stable condition.