#1 Wayne State Wildcats defeated St. Cloud State 3-1 (27-25, 25-19, 24-26, 25-21) inside Rice Auditorium Saturday afternoon. Wayne State is now the first back-to-back outright NSIC Champions since Concordia-St. Paul won eight straight NSIC Championships from 2003-2010. WSC also finishes the regular season with a 27-1 record while posting a 18-0 record in the NSIC. The Wildcats are also the first team since the 2014 Minnesota Duluth Volleyball team to post an unbeaten regular season record in the NSIC. With the loss, St. Cloud State falls to 20-7 with a 13-5 record in the NSIC.
Wayne State as a team hit .323 on the day with a total of 13 blocks. The Wildcats had four players with double digit kills with
Kelsie Cada leading with 15 kills. She was followed by
Taya Beller with 14 kills,
Maggie Brahmer with 11, and
Channatee Robles with ten.
Jordan McCormick and
Havyn Heinz would each have a pair of aces for the 'Cats while McCormick led the team with 23 digs. She was followed by Heinz with 19 and Cada with 14. Brahmer added seven blocks followed by
Taylor Bunjer with five, Beller with five and Robles with four.
For St. Cloud State as a team they hit .250 on the day led by Kenzie Foley with 21 kills. Foley also had 18 digs for the Huskies. Shelby Kimm also posted 20 digs along with 10 kills for the Huskies. The other Huskie with double digit kills was Hannah Bruskiewicz with 13 kills.
The two teams would trade points to open the contest. An early 3-1 run from the Wildcats would force the first Huskies timeout at 8-5 in favor of the 'Cats. WSC would build their largest lead of the set at 16-12 after a ball handling error forced the second SCSU timeout. The Huskies would go on a run of their own after the timeout with a 7-4 run including back-to-back points to cut the game to one at 20-19. WSC would get the match to a set point following a Brahmer kill at 24-23 before the two teams would trade points with SCSU gaining set point at 25-24 after a Foley Kill. WSC would score the last three points of the set with kills from Brahmer and Robles. The final point came off a Beller and Robles block giving WSC the 27-25 set win.
WSC would open set two tied up at 2-2 before the Wildcats went on a 5-2 run forcing the first Huskies timeout of the set at 7-3. Wayne State continue to keep their lead at least three points holding he 10-7 lead before an attack error and service error from the Huskies built the 'Cats lead back up to five at 12-7. SCSU would never cut more than three points into the Wildcat lead for the rest of the set. WSC would go on to win the second set following a Cada kill at 25-19.
The two teams would battle during the third set with St. Cloud State opening the early 5-2 lead in before the Wildcats would eventually battle back and tie the game at 9-9 and even take the lead after a Brahmer kill at 10-9. Two WSC kills from Beller and Robles shortly after would lead to an SCSU timeout at 15-14. WSC would build another two-point lead late into the set after the two teams would trade points at 22-20 forcing the final timeout of the set from the Huskies. WSC would have set point after a sneaky
Ally Beresford kill at 24-23, but St. Cloud State would score the last three points of the set after a Natalie Tesch kill and a pair of blocks winning the set 26-24 over WSC.
The two teams would continue the trend of trading points early into the fourth set with the score being 10-10 early in the set. WSC would then open a 6-3 run to open the game following back-to-back Beller scores giving WSC the 16-13 lead. Heinz would have back-to-back service aces out of the timeout followed by a Robles kill to open the biggest Wildcat lead of the match at 19-13. St. Cloud State would try to cut into the lead forcing WSC to take a timeout at 22-17 before the cats would end the match with a Brahmer kill defeating the Huskies 25-21 in set four.
With the Wildcats clinching the NSIC Regular Season Championship, they will be the top seed in the NSIC tournament. The Wildcats will await their opponent to be announced for Tuesday November 14
th for the first-round match. Game time will be 6 p.m. inside of Rice Auditorium.
