Indianapolis, Ind.- For the second weekend in a row, the #21 UMD volleyball team traveled out to play four games over two days in a competitive tournament setting, this time heading to Indianapolis for the UIndy Invitational. For the second week in a row, the Bulldogs will return home with a flawless record. It was far from a breeze, but UMD was able to sweep not only its Friday matchups of Missouri-St. Louis and Ashland but also its Saturday slate of Grand Valley State and tournament-host UIndy. 

The Bulldogs entered Saturday with a 6-0 record, and early in their first set against Grand Valley State, they certainly looked the part of an undefeated team well. UMD dredged the Lakers, rapidly developing a 7-1 lead. 7-1 turned to 10-3, then to 12-6, the Lakers making little progress in establishing their footing in the match. That is until the 14-7 mark, when Grand Valley State started a brief scoring tsunami of their own. A 5-0 Lakers run, complete with three straight kills and a service ace sandwiched around a Grace Daak attack error, quickly made things much more interesting at 14-12. A Duluth timeout at 14-10 wasn't enough to calm the tides. What did the trick instead was a 5-1 counterpunch of a run by the Bulldogs, one that saw them resolidify their lead at 19-13. This run also had a service ace as a cherry on top. The Lakers got right off the mat and started swinging back, scoring four straight coming out of a timeout and getting back within two points at 19-17. While the Bulldogs' ensuing run of three straight points to make the score 22-17 wasn't as big as some of the other blows dealt in this set in terms of pure size, it mattered the most out of any of them in terms of the match's scope. Sitting only three more points away from securing the set win, the Bulldogs absorbed a late Lakers push and took the set 25-20. 

The second set felt much different, with shades of the Bulldogs' tight matchup against Missouri-St.Louis on Friday. Once the teams tied it at 1-1, they couldn't help themselves but to re-even the score over and over again, the match having been tied a total of nine different times by the time the score was 10-10. The biggest lead of the match up to that point was when the Bulldogs had briefly held a 6-4 advantage. Knotted up at 10, something changed. A combination of Bulldog kills and three Laker errors suddenly made the score 15-11 UMD, doubling their earlier benchmark of a two-point advantage. 15-11 turned into 17-12, which turned into 20-13. Here, Grand Valley State coach Jason Johnson called his second timeout of the set, his earlier attempt having come at a score of 14-11. This time around, things went much different for his group, as they suddenly woke up offensively to go on a pivotal 4-0 run to keep things interesting late at 20-17. The Lakers would maintain this climbable distance all the way until the score was 22-19. At that point, the Bulldogs demonstrated an ability to do something important in matches like this: slam the door shut. After a timeout, UMD went on a 3-0 run to close out the set. Not only that, but they ended things with back-to-back Mary Satori services aces. Talk about wanting to wrap things up quickly. 

Even after a rather tough set, the Lakers continued to fight, replicating some of the early tightness from before UMD's big offensive run. Things only wobbled back and forth until a score of 6-6 this time around ,though, when the Bulldogs took a 2-0 run that had tied the match up for them and upped it to a 6-0 scoring streak, making the score 10-6. Making a return here was the cycle of dueling blows, as the Lakers saw this run and responded with a 7-3 scoring advantage of their own to leave the set at 13-13. Frustratingly for the Bulldogs, they had beaten themselves up more than the Lakers had during this stretch, with four of those seven points coming off of UMD errors. The Bulldogs finished the set looking as gut-punched as they have the entire year, never really being able to string anything together the rest of the way. The Lakers, meanwhile, would ride this wave of momentum into what ended up being a 12-3 run, ending the set at 25-16 and leaving behind no doubt that they had deserved it. 

This set revealed a pair of truths to the Bulldogs.

The first was that this Lakers squad was no joke defensively. Coach Boos placed heavy emphasis on this in his comments after today's matches.

"Grand Valley played some incredible defense,' Boos said. "There were some times where it looked like we'd clearly put the ball away, and next thing you know, ding-ding, and the ball is coming back over, and we have to do it again."

In the third set in particular, the Lakers combined for 20 total digs, eight more than the Bulldogs' team total of 12.

The Bulldogs would have to get a little more existential to understand the second truth, it being that in any given moment, there are two potential aggressors working against you: the other team and yourself.  Boos made note of his team's ability to subdue both of these forces while speaking about this particular set.
 
"Early in the season here, this group has shown an ability to respond to adversity, whether it's inflicted by the opponent or self-inflicted," Boos said. 

If there had ever been a time for the Bulldogs to display their response time to the latter of those wounds, it was in the fourth set of this matchup against the Lakers. At first, things progressed at a pace familiar in its stiffness, with things having been tied up a total of five times once the score hit 8-8. Then, the Bulldogs did something that had been unthinkable up to this point in the set: they took a three-point lead at 12-9. This advantage must have been the secret formula for success, as the Bulldogs would neither trail nor settle for a tied score for the entirety of the rest of the match. This three-scores lead that had once been so hard to come by soon ballooned into an 18-10 stranglehold of the set. capping off a 10-2 Bulldogs run from when the set had last been tied up at 8 apiece. It was far too late for the Lakers at this point. They actually outscored the Bulldogs 8-7 to close out the match, but this simply wasn't enough to offer in the face of the recent barrage. The Bulldogs took the set, and deservedly so, with a score of 25-18. This gave them a 3-1 win in the match and improved their overall record to 7-0. 

Boos spoke favorably about his squad's ability to bounce back after a third set that had clearly rattled them.

"To jump back in there in the 4th set and regain our composure, and regain our stability, says a lot about some of the growth that we've already made this year," Boos said. 

Sydney Lanoue was brilliant once again for the Bulldogs, this time leading the team with 15 kills. Madison Gordon was once again a persistent passer with a team-high 34 assists. Defensively, Daak was UMD's best blocker with five block assists, while Cianna Selbitschka became a new face in the department of team dig leaders with 15. The Lakers were led by 11 kills from Kendall Stover and 21 assists from Rachel Jacquay. Defensively, Jaelianna Primus led the way with 3 blocks while Julia Blaney and Savannah Thompson tied for the team lead in digs with 14.

What's strange is that the first set of UMD's match against UIndy was almost a microcosm of the Lakers match from earlier in the day. The Bulldogs jumped to an early 7-2 lead, forcing a timeout from the Greyhounds. Soon enough, it was 12-11. Not to take away from the Greyhounds' effort, as they did put up six of the points in this run through pure offensive production, but they also had some help from an unlikely benefactor: the Bulldogs themselves. In fact, at one point late in this Greyhounds comeback, there were three consecutive UMD errors that brought the lead down to two at 12-10. Once again, the Bulldogs caught themselves fighting a two-front war. Good thing they had experience. UMD employed their battle-tested strategy to impressive results, regathering themselves and a big lead in the process as the score suddenly sat at 19-11. A UIndy timeout here did about as much good for the Greyhounds as a late-set break had done for the Lakers before them- they were only delaying the inevitable. The Bulldogs made quick work of a 25-15 set. 

Suddenly, it's 9-9 in set two, and you remember that UIndy is coming into this set with a 5-1 record of their own and a pretty strong desire to add to that number on the left. Then you're down two with the score at 12-10, sitting in the huddle of a timeout wondering where all the time has gone. Post-game, Boos gave the Greyhounds kudos for their effort coming out of a tough opening set, an effort not entirely unlike what the Bulldogs had gone through between sets three and four of the Lakers matchup. Right when UMD was able to tie things up at 16-16 on a block by Daak and Grace Post, the Greyhounds took a small lead once again, going up 20-18. This produced yet another timeout out of Boos. Remember Boos' comment after Friday night's games that there is "no magic potion" to be used during timeouts to make a team suddenly come to life? Perhaps Boos was working up something in the lab Friday night, because his team went on a 7-1 run out of the break to steal the set 25-20. All seven of the Bulldogs' final points were kills, including three consecutive kills from Sydney Lanoue. As Boos himself put it, the team "flipped the switch." 

Someone must have bumped into the switch with their shoulder on accident after the second set and lodged it between two settings, because the third set was a nail-biter for most of its runtime. The two teams traded a miniscule lead back and fourth until it was tied up at 14-14. Again, the Greyhounds were still fighting hard, down but not out. That is until a 5-1 Bulldog run made the score 19-15. One might be quick to assume the switch had become dislodged, but this isn't really what happened. Instead, the Greyhounds found themselves deep within a struggle the Bulldogs were all too familiar with: they were fighting themselves. Four of the five points in this run came off of UIndy errors. Unfortunately for the Greyhounds, they wouldn't have another set to try to figure themselves out. The Bulldogs took the opportunity that had been given to them and ran with it, closing out the set with a final score of 25-20 and completing their sweep of the Greyhounds.

UMD was led on the scoresheet by 13 kills from Lanoue, but three other Bulldogs  (Samantha Paulsen, Hope Schjenken, and Selbitschka) each had 10 kills as well. This effort again spotlighted the ability to spread up the team's offensive attack evenly that Boos had been so happy with coming out of Friday's matches. To little surprise, Gordon led the way in assists with 39. Daak led the defense with four block assists while Kaylyn Madison regained her throne as digs leader with 15. For the Greyhounds, Grace Hegwood led the pack with eight kills while Sara Spalding was the team's best passer with 17 assists. Elizabeth Eads had the most blocks for UIndy with two total. Makenna Barnhart had a team-high 11 digs. 

BITS FROM BOOS:
What exactly does an 8-0 team do for an entire week before their next match? Boos says it's just business as usual. 

"It's continuing to work on fine-tuning the things that we're good at, but really, it's more about focusing on the things that really didn't go as well as you'd like," Boos said. 

Offense can be thrown in the "fine-tuning" pile. While it's clear that the Bulldog attack is a capable and proven one, Boos notes things are "running (at) a tempo where it requires some precision." Building upon that pinpoint accuracy would only make the Bulldogs an even more intimating team. Meanwhile, Boos still sees the defense as a work in progress.There were certainly still a handful of moments in this batch of games where the Bulldogs built up a formidable lead only to eventually squander it. While Boos saw some of the progress his team had made between matches on Friday translate over into Saturday's games, he'd still like to see more.

It's not lost on Boos that his team is still undefeated this many games into the season. By the sounds of it, it's not lost on his team, either. This isn't a point of complacency for these Bulldogs, though- it's a stepping stone. They want more. You don't hang banners for going 8-0 at the start of the regular season. According to Boos, this UMD squad is interested in doing some real interior design work to Romano Gymnasium this year. 

"This is a good group right now," Boos said. "They're hard working, and I think they're really motivated to get back into the fold where we have been in terms of the conference and trying to get into the postseason picture again. They're focused." 

KNOCKING ON THE DOOR OF 500 DIGS:
With 15 more digs across Saturday's matches, Madison Gordon now has 488 career digs, just 12 away from 500 for her career.

UP NEXT:
UMD may be done with tournament play (for now), but their weekend traveling trend will continue. The Bulldogs will head to North Dakota Friday to take on Minot State at 7:00 p.m. and stay in North Dakota to face Mary at 2:00 p.m. on Saturday.