The No. 25 Upper Iowa volleyball team suffered a five-set loss on the road to No. 19 St. Cloud State University in St. Cloud, Minn. on Saturday afternoon. The Peacocks held tough through a suspension of play during the third set due to a tornado warning in the St. Cloud area and took a 2-1 lead on their hosts. The Peacocks had several chances to end the match in the fourth set, but couldn't close out the Huskies, who claimed the match with a tight fifth-set decision.
UIU fell to 8-2 overall and 0-2 in the conference after traveling to face the No. 4 University of Minnesota Duluth on Friday. St. Cloud State improved to 10-0 on the season and 2-0 in the NSIC after winning by scores of 26-24, 17-25, 23-25, 26-24, 15-13.
The match was a showdown between two of the best hitters and best backline defenders in the Northern Sun. For UIU,
Anna Winter recorded 27 kills, while Rachel Linsey posted 26 for SCSU. Defensively, the Peacocks were led by
Haley Weepie's 21 digs, and the Huskies were led by Clara Krenz's 23 digs and Linsey's 20.
Winter and Linsey were nearly unstoppable on the attack. Winter hit .344 with only 5 errors to go with her 27 kills on 64 swings, while Linsey hit .340 with 8 errors on her 53 swings.
Upper Iowa's
Carlee Ketchum handed out 45 assists to pace the attack, while
Kaitlin Niedert recorded 10 kills and
Maggie Streightiff added 9. Winter posted the second-most digs in the match with 14, while three other players reached double figures.
The biggest issue for Upper Iowa was closing out the first and fourth sets. In the opening frame, a pair of
Anna Winter kills gave UIU a 24-22. But St. Cloud State scored the final four points of the set sparked by a ball handling error on UIU, to secure a win in set one. After UIU scored a pair of wins in sets two and three, the Peacocks took a 24-21 lead late in the fourth set needing only one point to win the match. The point never came as St. Cloud State rattled off five straight points, thanks in large part to another ball handling error on the Peacocks that started the rally, to win the fourth set 26-24 and force the fifth set.
In the fifth frame, the two teams were tied at 11-11, but after a service error on UIU, the two teams just exchanged big hits from Winter and Linsey. St. Cloud knocked down the final point of the match to win the final set 15-13.
Upper Iowa will finally open their home slate next Friday and Saturday, Sept. 27-28 against the University of Minnesota Crookston and Bemidji State University.
