> Box Score

ST. PAUL, Minn. – No. 7 Southwest Minnesota State earned its first victory of the season on Saturday morning defeating Ashland (Ohio) 3-1 at the Concordia-St. Paul Classic. SMSU won by scores of 25-23, 25-7, 22-25, 25-21.
 
Abbey Thissen and Sarah Parker had big matches to lead the Mustangs, combining for 31 kills and both finishing with hitting percentages over .420. Thissen drilled a match-high 20 kills and hit .429, while Parker recorded 11 kills and finished with a .455 hitting percentage.
 
Emilee Gutzmer dished out 24 assists and had 11 digs, while Megan Larson had 18 assists and eight digs. Hannah Bennett added a match-high 17 digs, with teammate Whitney Burmeister finishing with 13 digs.
 
SMSU finished the match with a .169 hitting percentage and limited AU to a .069 percentage.  
 
The teams played a tight first set with SMSU snapping a 23-23 tie with a kill by Emilee Guztmer and a hitting error by AU to earn a 25-23 victory.
 
It was all SMSU in set two as the Mustangs jumped to a 13-2 lead and never looked back in winning 25-7. SMSU hit and outstanding .696 in the set with 16 kills and zero errors on 23 attacks.
 
AU (0-3) rallied to take set three 25-22 and built a 14-9 lead in set four, before SMSU answered with a 10-2 run to take the lead and went on to secure a 25-21 set victory.
 
SMSU concludes the two-day tournament later today at 2:30 p.m. versus Missouri S&T.