MARSHALL, Minn. – No. 5 Southwest Minnesota State defeated No. 19 Minnesota Duluth in a thrilling five-set victory (25-20, 25-19, 20-25, 22-25, 15-9) at the PE Gym on Friday night. The victory was the third against a ranked opponent this season.
Angela Young collected a season-high 21 kills and added six digs and three blocks, while
Meg Schmidt filled the stat sheet with 13 kills, five blocks, three aces, and three digs.
Katelyn Nichols and
Emma VanHeel lifted the defense, hosting the Mustang block party by leading the team with eight and five blocks respectively. VanHeel also collected a career-high 12 kills, while Nichols had a career-high eight kills and five aces.
UMD was led by Cianna Selbitschka with 17 of the 52 Bulldog kills, while adding eight digs and three aces.
Alisa Bengen paced the Mustang offense with 46 assists and seven digs while
Payton Hjerleid lead the defensive end with 15 digs.
The Mustangs bounced back early in set one after falling to a 3-0 deficit to start the set. An 11-2 run gave them an 11-5 lead that would be held the rest of the set. The Mustangs would climb to a 24-16 lead, before a 4-0 UMD run narrowed the lead. Nichols had enough of it, as she delivered a kill to top off a 25-20 victory.
The second set was all Mustangs, as they never trailed. A 6-2 lead jumpstarted the Mustangs out of the gate, and a 5-0 run that made the set 12-4 highlighted the early dominance. A 24-14 lead would turn to a 24-19 lead, as the Bulldogs would provide a second straight preview of their resilience that sent the game to five sets. Young would cap the set off with a kill to give the Mustangs a two-set lead.
Set three saw a reversal of what SMSU was able to accomplish in set one, as UMD jumped to a 9-4 lead that would trigger a Mustang timeout. It was also a reversal of set one, as it was SMSU that would turn a 24-14 deficit into a 24-20 deficit before UMD was able to close it out.
Set four looked to be the final one early, as SMSU jumped to a 6-3 lead before Nichols was able to string three straight aces together to force a UMD timeout. The Mustangs were able to turn it into a 14-10 lead, before a videoboard malfunction created a loud noise out of the speaker that would ignite the Bulldogs. A 4-0 run would tie it up at 14-14, and UMD would win 11 of the next 19 points to send the match to a fifth set.
Set five looked to drift into UMD's favor, as they capitalized off three SMSU errors to take a 3-0 lead. The lead would linger to 7-5 before a pair of Schmidt kills and a UMD error gave SMSU an 8-7 lead. UMD would attempt to extinguish the SMSU fire with a timeout, but a block by Schmidt and VanHeel and kill by Schmidt caused another UMD timeout as the Mustangs led 10-7. UMD would score two of three points out of the timeout, but four straight points to end the set would lift the Mustangs to victory.
The game marked the first five-set match for the Mustangs since defeating Northern State 3-2 in Aberdeen on Nov. 8, 2019.
The Mustang block party provided a full spread, as they collected a season-high 13 blocks.
Halle Jansen was able to collect a career-high two of the blocks, while also adding a career-high six kills.
Southwest Minnesota State will travel to MSU Moorhead on Friday, Oct. 1 at 6 p.m. before going to Aberdeen for a date with Northern State on Saturday, Oct 2 at 6 p.m.
