If you want to craft a good story, adding in a hero isn't a bad place to start. If it's a great story you're after, make that hero an underdog. 

The Bulldogs' 3-0 win on the road against Bemidji State on Saturday made for a pretty great story. The headliner? Payton Addink.

This narrative situated the Bulldogs away from Romano, which is never an easy ask regardless of the opponent. It becomes a little easier, however, when the away squad is able to build up a 7-1 lead to start the first set. That's the route UMD decided to take on Saturday. Despite some pushback from the Beavers, the score was soon 9-3. That's when the woman of the hour- of the week, really- first subbed into the match. 

It took exactly one rally for Addink to make her presence known. A kill from the sophomore outside hitter off of a Madison Gordon assist made the score 10-3. After two Bemidji errors, Addink put the ball into the ground once again to make it 13-5. Addink couldn't bear to take so long to contribute again- she waited just one point (from a Gordon  service ace) to record her third kill, leaving the set at 15-5 UMD. Just like that, the Beavers were forced to call their second and final timeout of the frame. Addink had touched the ball three total times throughout the set, and each time, she'd been terminal. 

Could she go four-for-four? As if this was even a question. After a UMD service error temporarily deprived them of their double-digit lead in the set, Addink re-established it with another kill to make it 16-6. Credit to the Beavers- they didn't bow down in the face of this performance from Addink and company. Bemidji came storming back off of a 5-0 run to leave the Bulldogs with a much less formidable 16-11 lead and one less timeout at their disposal. The Beavers would keep the lead down to five all the way until the score was 19-14. Once a Hope Schjenken kill landed the Bulldogs atop the 20-point plateau, Addink decided it was time to take charge once again. She rallied off two quick kills to give the Bulldogs a seven-point cushion late in the set at 22-15. From that point onwards, UMD started pulling out every trick in the book. Another Gordon service ace made it 23-15. a block from Grace Daak made it 24-15. A return to tradition in the form of a pure kill by Daak sealed the deal on the set 25-15 and gave the Bulldogs a 1-0 lead in the match. 

In just one set, Addink had drawn just two kills away from eclipsing her career-high of seven, a milestone she'd hit... two days before (on her birthday, no less). Even still, compelling stories don't force one character to do it all, hero or not. In fact, the second set posed an interesting question: what's wrong with having two heroes?

Bemidji took its first lead of the entire match at a score of 1-0 off of a Rylie Bjerklie kill. This must have inspired some confidence, because the Beavers were able to keep things dead-even until a score of 4-4. Kills from Bulldogs Gordon and Schjenken gave UMD a 6-4 lead, and then... Sydney Lanoue happened. She rifled off two-consecutive kills of her own to make the score 8-4 and snatch a timeout from Bemidji. Out of the break, Lanoue tacked on one more kill for good measure to make it 9-4. This helped the Bulldogs establish some decent distance between themselves and the Beavers for the first time in the set (peaking at 10-4), but it wasn't enough space for Bemidji to simply throw their hands in the air and stop running. The Beavers kept battling, eventually cutting the lead back down to four at a score of 11-7 UMD.  Looking to avenge her service error that had brought the Beavers to this score, Lanoue tallied her fourth kill of the set to make it 12-7. A familiar face in Addink would add to her numbers with a kill of her own to make it 14-8.

By the time the score was 16-8 UMD, it sure didn't look like they had any interest in giving up their advantage. This drive was particularly evident in Lanoue. She snagged a kill to make the score 18-10, and when a Bemidji kill temporarily stripped the Bulldogs of an eight-point advantage, Lanoue responded in kind with another kill to make it 19-11. Later kills by Addink (again, for a new career-high) and Daak left things at 22-13 and left the Bulldogs on the brink of taking a double-digit lead that would be all but insurmountable this late into the set, but the Beavers still wouldn't stand down. Two quick Bemidji points actually got a timeout from UMD as the Bulldogs looked to make sure there'd be no shenanigans in the rest of the second frame. Unfortunately, shenanigans still came all the same. The Beavers emerged from the break with a 3-1 run to bring the Bulldogs' lead all the way down to four at 23-19. At this point, Paulsen decided to put a stamp of her own onto this match. She rallied off an exclamation point in the form of two-consecutive kills to end the set 25-19 and affirm a 2-0 match lead for UMD. 

Speaking of Paulsen... got room for a third hero? One that's 6'3", maybe?

Sure hope so, because Paulsen opened the third frame of this match by recording four of the first five Bulldog points by herself. Each one of them was badly needed, too, as Bemidji continued to battle despite being on its last leg in the match. Paulsen's fourth kill of the frame made it just 5-3 UMD. Paulsen had more than done her share, but she wasn't going to be able to carry UMD through this set by her lonesome. 

What happened next made this set feel more like a play being brought to life rather than part of a volleyball match. 

Lanoue got back on the board with a kill to make the score 7-3. Hope you didn't forget about Addink despite a slower second frame, because she got back into the action to make it 10-5. Another Addink kill eventually left the score at 14-7 UMD. Despite run support being secured, Paulsen still wasn't done, either. She got another kill to make it 15-8 UMD. Kill by Lanoue- 17-9. Kill by Addink- 20-12. Uh oh, Addink again- 21-12. Paulsen jumped back into the fold with a kill to give UMD a ten-point lead at 23-12. Who better to send us all home than Lanoue, who notched the set-winning kill at 25-14 to secure a 3-0 match sweep for the Bulldogs. Three powerful forces working in perfect harmony to drive their team to a victory- it's hard not to get sappy about it. 

Just as it's hard not to marvel at the final numbers this trifecta had put up by the end of the match. Who better to lead them than Addink, in just her fourth match of the entire year. Addink had a team-high in kills with 12 that doubled as a new career-high. She nearly doubled her previous best effort of seven. Addink was not only at her most terminal but also her most efficient- her .556 hitting percentage was a new career best, too. Lanoue ended things with 11 kills on a .476 percentage. She paired this with a team-leading eight digs. Paulsen tied Lanoue with 11 kills of her own, hers coming at an efficiency clip of exactly .500. 

It's important not to forget that word team, though. For as great as Paulsen and Lanoue were, and for as improbable of a performance as Addink had, these were just three of the ten Bulldogs that saw the court against the Beavers. All the way down the stats sheet, important contributions can be seen. Take Schjenken for example, who notched eight kills of her own in the match on a jaw-dropping .800 hitting percentage. What about the person setting all of these attacks up? That'd be Gordon, who ended the night with 44 assists. Daak closed the night with two solo blocks to pair with a block assist to lead the team in that figure for the match. Despite the best efforts of the day's terrific trio, this win doesn't happen without these names and others coming to play. 

BITS FROM BOOS: 
UMD head coach Jim Boos' thoughts after the match reflected these sentiments.

Boos certainly gave Addink her due flowers for the kind of performance she was able to put up Saturday, one made even more important by the absence of the team's leading attacker in Cianna Selbitschka. Along the way, Boos acknowledged just how hard Addink had been battling up until the fresh opportunity that this week presented to her, something that makes seeing this kind of result all the more fulfilling. 

"Obviously, Payton started out there in the beginning of the year, and we had some struggles there, and we made a lineup change," Boos said. "She's just kept working. To her credit, as she continues to work, she continues to make change and continues to improve. She got to reap some of the benefits of that work and had a really good offensive night tonight."
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If you'll recall Addink's comments after her earlier career night on Thursday against Crookston, her first instinct was to give kudos to the rest of her team for how they'd helped her come into her own. There's no doubt that she'd be ringing a similar bell even after a performance like the one she had on Saturday. It's the very fact that this kind of effort was a part of a team system, in fact created by that team system, that makes it so special. A happy team means a happy player that's prone to create a happy performance, which creates a happy team... so on and so on. 

In the spirit of this, Boos gave a lot of credit to his team's overall ability to pull off the kind of performance they had on Saturday and beyond despite the irregularities that could have stood in their way. That goes without mentioning the lingering effects of a loss like the Bulldogs had against Concordia a week ago, another force Boos was happy to see his team be able to conquer.

"Certainly that was part of the nervousness of it all is with a lineup change, you never know how your team's going to handle it and react to it," Boos said. "Not only to go out there and be able to play as well as we did and win in three but to do it with the subs that we had out there... I'm proud of their bounce back."

As for what's next...

"Obviously, we've got a big match coming up on Tuesday that they're going to be excited to play in, so hopefully they enjoyed the week and the wins and we get back to work on Monday to get ready to go," Boos said.