It was a memorable night inside Romano Gymnasium as the University of Minnesota Duluth honored its three seniors and put the finishing touches on a four-set (25-22, 25-13, 17-25, 25-23) thumping of the University of Sioux Falls Saturday. It was a grueling victory, the Bulldogs' third in as many outings, at the end as it dropped the third set and was in jeopardy of going to a fifth set but rallied to pull out the fourth set. UMD (22-4, 15-3 Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference) trailed by as much as five points but were able to battle back to tie the set the Cougars (16-12, 8-10 NSIC) at 20 before scraping it out. The Bulldogs capped off a perfect regular season home record at Romano, the first time since 2014 when it went 10-0 in the regular season and 14-1 overall at home.

Junior right side hitter Sarah Kelly backed up her 23-kill performance from last night with 20 kills tonight, marking the first time in her career with back-to-back 20-plus efforts. The 2016 All-American hit .548 from the floor and .542 for the week. Freshman outside hitter Kate Berg backed up another strong match using six of her 14 kills in the opening set. Sophomore middle blocker Abby Thor racked up seven of the team's 12 blocks and added in six kills. Sophomore setter Emily Torve dished out 45 assists and guided the Bulldog attack to a hitting percentage of .243. Sophomore libero Keena Seiffert paced the UMD back row with 18 digs with senior defensive specialist Kelly Madison gathering 12 digs. 

The Bulldogs demolished the Cougars in the second set, hitting .433 with only two errors. UMD had the early advantage then used three straight kills from Berg to parlay that lead out to 10-3 and getting USF to burn a timeout. The Cougars could will the deficit down to five as the Bulldogs continued to charge forward before needing three set points to exterminate the set.

Kasandra Springer and Janelle Jam paced USF in the third set. Springer totaled five kills while Lam scooped up six digs in the set. Their production frustrated the Bulldogs to a set-low .031-clip as the Cougars countered with .323. USF used a 7-2 in the middle of the frame to seize control and almost did the same in the fourth before UMD found a way through. Down 15-10, the Bulldogs depended on Kelly and the strategy paid off. Kelly bombarded five of her 10 kills in the set in the forthcoming rally. Kelly and Berg combined for kills then Berg teamed with Thor to send back a Bria Barfnecht attack before Kelly blasted home another kill to tie the set at 20. Thor hammered the final kill after a brief timeout by Jim Boos at 24-23. 

Seniors Sarah Heesacker, Madison and Allison Olley were honored with a brief ceremony after the match. Since their arrival on campus the trio have combined to go 103-19 (.844). Olley ended with five kills and four blocks. Heesacker posted three assists and dig in limited action. 

The Bulldogs wrap up the 2017 regular season on the road versus No. 16 Augustana University and No. 22 Wayne State College.