ABERDEEN, S.D. – The No. 16 Southwest Minnesota State volleyball team battled to earn a five-set win over No. 18 Northern State 18-25, 25-17, 25-17, 14-25, 15-9 in the final regular season NSIC match inside Wachs Arena.

SMSU finishes the regular season 23-4 and 14-4 in NSIC play, tying with Wayne State for a third-place finish in the conference. NSU finishes the regular season 20-6 overall and fifth in the NSIC with a 12-6 record.

Four Mustang attackers swung for double-digit kills in the victory. Karli Arkell led the way with a career-high 16 kills on an efficient .406 hitting percentage and jumped up for three blocks. Ashley Peltier followed with 15 kills on .233 hitting and jumped for five block assists on defense. Leah Jones and Emma VanHeel recorded 12 kills apiece. Jones added 16 digs for a double-double and Emma VanHeel jumped for five block assists.

Sydney Thein supported the offense with 52 assists. She also recorded three kills and an ace offensively and notched a double-double with 15 digs on defense.

McKenzie Tolk led the SMSU defense to 84 digs. Tolk recorded 25 digs and supported offensively with four assists. Mya Krystosek and Kennedy Drake recorded 12 and eight digs, respectively.

Hanna Thompson led the NSU offense with 16 kills on .350 hitting. Natalia Szybinska followed by recording 12 kills and four digs. Keri Walker anchored the NSU backline with 23 digs.

The first set was filled with action from the very start. SMSU quickly moved to an 8-7 lead until the Wolves picked up steam and went on a 7-1 run to lead 14-9. MSUM would play hard to hold the lead until a score of 21-14, forcing an SMSU timeout. 

Coming out of the timeout, the Mustangs rattled off two straight points, but the effort would be too little and NSU would take the set.

SMSU dominated sets two and three. The Mustangs used a 6-3 lead to gain momentum and never looked back in claiming the second set win. The third set saw the teams battle to a stalemate at 16-16 until SMSU finally broke away. The Mustangs limited the Wolves to just one more point, rattling off a 9-1 run to close set three and take a 2-1 match lead.

Set four saw the teams trade runs before the score settled at 12-11 in favor of Northern State. NSU took control of the match by scoring the next seven points to lead by seven going down the stretch. SMSU would attempt to comeback, but the effort would stall after its 14th point, with NSU cruising to the fourth set victory.

SMSU started the fifth set hot, using four kills paired with an ace to take a 6-0 lead early. The match looked like it was coming to a close when SMSU took an 11-5 lead, but NSU stormed back to cut the deficit to two points at 11-9, SMSU. The Mustangs reset and swept the final four points to close out the match. 

Although finishing in a tie for third with Wayne State, due to strength of schedule SMSU is the No. 4 seed in the NSIC Tournament and will host the No. 5 seed Northern State for the first round on Tuesday, with first serve set for 6 p.m.