The #9 UMD volleyball team earned a huge rebound win Friday night, outlasting seventh-ranked Southwest Minnesota State (SMSU) in a five-set showdown in Marshall. The Bulldogs propel to a 14-1 record with the victory in what was their third match to go the distance this season. 

Things looked bleak for UMD out of the gate, SMSU jumping out to an early 7-2 run in which they looked untouchable. A Samantha Paulsen kill to make things 7-3 seemed to expose a hole in the Mustangs' armor- one the Bulldogs would take full advantage of. Soon enough, the score was knotted up at 8. Not long after, the Bulldogs had secured a small lead of their own at 14-10. This forced a timeout out of SMSU's first-year head coach Tyler Boddy. His Mustangs would trim the deficit down to two several times out of the break (first at 15-13, then 17-15 and finally at 18-16), but the Bulldogs never let SMSU within a point of tying things up. At the 18-16 mark, the Bulldogs decided to end the suspense- they went on a 7-1 run to close out the set at 25-17. UMD went into the second set on a 23-10 run with a 1-0 match score to show for it. Grace Daak and Samantha Paulsen were big for the Bulldogs in this set, each of them closing things out with four kills on hitting percentages above .300 (.429 for Daak and .333 for Paulsen). Hope Schjenken had three of UMD's eight block assists. Madison Gordon had nine assists.

Despite the big set victory, the Bulldogs started the second set in familiar fashion- down big early, this time at a score of 9-3. Though it worked out okay for his Bulldogs the first time around, head coach Jim Boos didn't enjoy seeing history repeat itself and called a timeout. Unfortunately, this set would take a much different path from this point onward. There was no quick spark of points from the Bulldogs to force the issue this time around. UMD did keep things interesting down the stretch, even marching back to within three points at a few moments (scores of 13-10, 16-13 and 17-14). It was at that 17-14 score that the wheels fell off of the bus for the Bulldogs in this set, though; the Mustangs rallied off a decisive 8-1 burst to take the set 25-15 and tie the match up at one apiece. Sydney Lanoue led the set with three of the Bulldogs' 10 kills. Gordon had seven assists. 

The third set established an entirely new rhythm. Neither team jumped out to a big lead early. Instead, the Bulldogs and the Mustangs were in lockstep for the vast majority of the third frame. Throughout the set, the score was even a total of nine times. Up until the end of the set, the largest lead either team had held was three, something the Mustangs were able to achieve three times. At 18-15, the last time SMSU was able to pull of this feat in such a tight match, the Bulldogs decided they wanted a lead of their own- so they got one. UMD employed an old trick, something that had already been put to use by both teams thus far, a kind of through line between these three sets: a late-set blitz. When the smoke settled, the Bulldogs had gone on a 10-3 run to win the set 25-21. Schjenken led a well-distributed Bulldog attack with five kills on a hyper-efficient .571 hitting percentage. Gordon had 15 assists. 

For the Bulldogs' next trick, they took a play out of the Mustangs' book and made it their own, jumping out to their first big lead early in a set at 11-6. The Mustangs would storm back to make the score 12-10 UMD just for the Bulldogs to re-establish a 16-12 advantage. Then, the Mustangs really stormed back- not only to even footing but to a slight advantage of their own. Suddenly, the score was 19-17 SMSU. Despite this sudden surge, the Bulldogs didn't back down the rest of the way. Quite the contrary- they went on a 7-3 run of their own to make the score 24-22. Sitting within one point of a massive match victory, the Bulldogs gave up a kill. Then another kill. Then another. A Schjenken attack error suddenly brought the Bulldogs from the brink of victory to the brink of heartbreak, the Mustangs stealing the set 26-24 on the back of a 4-0 run. Three Bulldogs had tied for the team-lead in kills with three (Lanoue, Schjenken, and Cianna Selbitschka). Gordon had 10 assists. 

For as easy as it would have been for the Bulldogs to come out in the fifth and final set looking dejected, they jumped out to a  4-0 lead instead. Then, a 7-3 advantage- old habits die hard. The Mustangs came out of a timeout and cut the Bulldog lead down to two at a score of 7-5, but that's the closest they'd get to evening things up for the rest of this extra frame. UMD took that two-point lead and cushioned it to six- they took the set 15-9 and the match, a doozy it was, 15-9. The Bulldogs snagged the lead at 1-0 and never gave it up. In this final frame, a few heroes materialized. Paulsen led the Bulldogs in kills with three, doing it on a .400 hitting percentage. Daak had just two kills in this set, but she did so flawlessly on a perfect hitting percentage. Schjenken may have registered two errors in this set, but she made up for them by assisting on two blocks and adding in a solo block to boot. 

After all of this, it's not too difficult to believe the numbers on the final stat sheet. Four different Bulldogs registered double-digit kills- Paulsen with 14, Daak and Schjenken with 12 apiece, and Selbitschka with 11. You don't win a five set affair with just offense, though- the Bulldogs also had four players eclipse 10 digs. Kaylyn Madison led the way with 16. With 14 digs of her own, Selbitschka recorded a double-double, her seventh of the season. And keep an eye out for #6- she's now just eight digs away from 500 on her career. Lanoue had 13 digs. Gordon closed out the dig party with 11, pairing those with her 46 assists. Schjenken was a pure defensive force; she had nine block assists and a solo block. The Bulldogs combined for 15 total blocks for the match.

For the Mustangs, Meg Schmidt was a standout- she had 18 kills on a .350 hitting percentage to go along with five block assists. Alisa Bengen was the team's leading setter with 40 assists. Abby Meister had a team-high 20 digs. Two different Mustangs were involved in six blocks- Karli Arkell had six block assists, while Emma VanHeel had three block assists to pair with three solo blocks. 

If you can believe it, it's actually possible to summarize everything said above in just one word. Boos accomplished this to open his thoughts about the match. Even still, he elaborated a little further, shedding light on his team's tenacity more specifically. 

"Grind of a match," Boos said. "Both teams had their moments, and both teams gave up runs. The ending of the 4th set could've sunk us, but the bounce back we had to start the 5th by going up 4-0 righted the ship and got us to the believe we could pull it out. It was a great atmosphere for a top-ten Division II matchup. Incredibly proud of the fight we showed in the 5th set to come away with the win."

Here's a new sentence for you: unfortunately for UMD, Bulldogs do not hibernate. It's right back to action for this group on Saturday at 2:00 PM, when they'll match up against a 9-5 Sioux Falls squad off the heels of a tough 3-1 loss against #4 St. Cloud State. As great as a win against such a stout opponent in SMSU looks for the Bulldogs in isolation, it might mean little to them if they can't keep the ball rolling against the Cougars to close out the weekend. A date of their own with St. Cloud State awaits the Bulldogs on Tuesday, and they'll want all the momentum that they can get heading into that one.