THE OPENING SERVE:
There will be little rest for the UMD volleyball team after a big weekend of road wins against then-#7 Southwest Minnesota State (SMSU) and Sioux Falls. The Bulldogs will take their newly-earned #6 ranking in this week's AVCA Poll to St. Cloud on Tuesday (6:00 p.m.) for yet another tough matchup away from Romano against the #7 Huskies. 

SCOUTING REPORT ON ST. CLOUD STATE:
This past weekend, the Bulldogs encountered a team fresh off of the heels of a coaching reign that lasted more than a decade. Tuesday, UMD will cross paths with a Huskies program head manned by a coach poised to leave a similar legacy, one whose NCAA coaching tenure at-large has already crossed the 20-season plateau.

From the moment he graduated college in 2000, St. Cloud State head coach Chad Braegelmann has been overseeing collegiate volleyball clubs. His first coaching stint was a seven-year run with Division III's Colby-Sawyer from 2001 to 2008. He then took a job with his alma matter, Minnesota Morris, and coached there for another seven seasons. Finally, ahead of the 2015 season, Braegelmann settled into St. Cloud. Across all three stops, Braegelmann has been a winner- he's never left a program with a winning percentage below .500 under his watch (Colby-Sawyer 156-80 (.661), Minn. Morris 129-91 (.586), St. Cloud State 114-79 (.591)).

The scariest part for teams that line up against the Huskies on match days? It appears as if Braegelmann may only be getting better with time.

St. Cloud State's 2021 campaign, Braegelmann's seventh year with the team, saw the Huskies go 27-5. This would be impressive enough on its own, but the hits didn't stop coming. This record was good enough to win the Huskies their first regular season NSIC championship since 1982. Not enough for you? It wasn't enough for St. Cloud Sate, either- they'd also win their first ever NSIC tournament title in that same season. For his efforts, Braegelmann earned NSIC Coach of the Year honors for the second season in a row.

In what is now year eight of the Braegelmann era, business is still booming. The Huskies are 14-2 overall, 6-2 in a tight NSIC field. Their only losses have come against a still-unbeaten #1 Wayne State and an SMSU team that came into the weekend ranked seventh in the nation. As he ventures towards a decade as a Husky, it's safe to say Braegelmann would like to snag some more hardware for his squad to help him celebrate that feat.

With the kind of team the Huskies have this season, this dream is far from farfetched. Particularly on offense, St. Cloud State is a force to be reckoned with. Junior Kenzie Foley's 4.34 kills per set slots her at 16th in the nation in that stat- she has 217 kills on the season. The main Husky feeding Foley and company the ball isn't having a bad season, either. Emma Berran is working at a clip of 11.12 assists per set right now- that's the seventh-best average in the country. She has 545 assists on the year. Berran's doing all of this as a freshman. 

Though it has its two stalwarts, the Huskies offense is working well as a cumulative unit- maybe a little better than well. St. Cloud State is seventh in the nation in team assists per set with 13.02. They're fifth in the country in kills per set with 14.42. These figures somehow become even more frightening when you consider that the Huskies are doing it all at a 0.298 team hitting percentage, which is third best in the nation. 

And don't count out the St. Cloud State defense. It's lead by sophomore Keely Kurschner's 203 digs (3.90 D/S) and senior Phebie Rossi's 60 blocks (1.18 B/S). 

BITS FROM BOOS:
There are parallels between where this St. Cloud State squad finds itself now and where UMD was just a week ago. In that way, UMD head coach Jim Boos knows more than anyone that the Huskies will be an especially tough out on Tuesday, a team eager to avenge a loss that, in their case, was inches away from being a victory.  The Huskies also have an advantage heading into a tough rebound match that the Bulldogs were not fortunate enough to enjoy. 

"Same thought process we had after losing to Wayne and having to play Southwest- you're going to expect their best," Boos said. "You're going to expect them to be really focused. They're back at home- you always tend to have the comfort of home rallying you a little bit... They went five with Southwest just like we did- we just happened to pull it out. They were right on the brink as well... There's not a big gap between a lot of teams in the Northern Sun when it comes to an individual volleyball match and an individual moment- it can go either way."

Even in this toss-up world of NSIC play, it sure doesn't hurt to have as strong of a squad as you can entering these tight contests. The Bulldogs have proven that they have a group that can hang, but so too have the Huskies. Boos is well aware of the kind of core that St. Cloud State has, especially on offense, and he doesn't see things slowing down on Tuesday. 

"I would expect them to be extremely aggressive," Boos said. "It's a big challenge because that's a really polished team with three extremely high-level attackers between their two outsides and Rossi in the middle. Those three are as good as there are in our league at their positions. I expect that they will be dialed in and ready to go, and certainly I hope we are as well, and if so, I expect it to be a really good battle."

THE SERIES:
As if it isn't to be expected at this point, the Bulldogs hold an all-time lead in their matchups against the Huskies at 74-36. The Huskies do hold the last win in the series, though, a 3-0 victory in the 2021 season at a time in which St. Cloud State was #14 in the country.

THE BROADCAST:
Follow Tuesday's match live on the NSIC Network through the link below: 
vs St. Cloud State (Saturday, October 3 @6:00 p.m.): https://bit.ly/3RtjlHz

LAST TIME OUT:
It wasn't perfect- and the Bulldogs themselves know this- but UMD's performance last weekend was much-needed all the same. The Bulldogs followed a five-set victory in an instant classic against SMSU (one in which they survived a scare when the Mustangs forced the extra set) with a 3-0 sweep against a Sioux Falls team that fought valiantly through all three sets.

UP NEXT:
The schedule will offer the Bulldogs an olive branch to make up for the early-week road trip in the form of another home stand this weekend. The first visitor will be Winona State on Friday, October 7 at 6:00 p.m. for UMD volleyball's Pink Out Game to support breast cancer awareness. The Bulldogs will close out the week with an appearance from Upper Iowa on Saturday, October 8 at 4:00 p.m as part of Alumni Weekend.