Box Score

MANKATO, Minn. - No. 2 Southwest Minnesota State extended its winning streak to 15-straight with a 25-18, 25-11, 27-25 road victory over Minnesota State on Friday night at the Taylor Center.

The win keeps SMSU (24-3, 17-2 NSIC) in a first place tie in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference standings with No. 1 Concordia-St. Paul and Northern State with one match remaining.

SMSU will face CSP to conclude the regular season tomorrow in St. Paul with the winner earning the NSIC regular season championship. NSU can also claim a share of the title with a win at Minnesota Duluth.

CSP handed SMSU its last loss prior to the current winning streak with a 3-1 win in Marshall on Sept. 25.

SMSU last won an NSIC regular season championship in 2012 and also won conference titles in 1985 and 2001.

On Friday, Taylor Reiss led the Mustangs with a match-high 14 kills and finished hitting .480. Kenzie Beekman recorded nine kills, while Abbey Thissen added eight to help the Mustang attack.

SMSU finished hitting .327 (50-16-104) and recorded four team blocks.

Whitney Burmeister finished with a team-high 22 digs to lead the Mustang defense, which limited MSU (15-12, 12-9 NSIC) to a .172 hitting percentage. Megan Larson finished with 43 assists.

In the opening set, SMSU trailed 12-11, but a 7-0 run, which included three kills by Reiss, gave SMSU an 18-12 lead and the Mustangs never looked back.

SMSU jumped to a 6-1 lead in set two and eventually pushed the margin to 18-6 to cruise to the win. The Mustangs hit .471 in the set and limited the Mavericks to just a .120 mark.

Set three was a much different story as SMSU fended off three set points for MSU before rallying past to earn the victory.

SMSU trailed 18-12, but slowly fought back into the set and eventually made the score 21-20 in favor of MSU following kills from Reiss and Thissen. The Mavericks answered with three straight points to push the margin to 24-20.

SMSU then started its rally behind the serving of Kaylee Burmeister. After an MSU service error made the score 24-21, kills from Thissen and Reiss cut the deficit to 24-23, before a service ace by Burmeister tied the set at 24-24. Reiss then gave SMSU a short-lived 25-24 advantage, before a hitting error by the Mustangs ended the run.

SMSU would counter with two straight points-a kill from Thissen followed by an Eisha Oden kill-to give SMSU the set and match win.

Saturday's match begins at 4 p.m. from CSP's Gangelhoff Center.