Volleyball Wins In Four Sets At Nebraska Wesleyan
Oct 11, 2019
LINCOLN, Neb. – The University of Dubuque volleyball team kicked off the weekend with a 3-1 (16-25, 25-21, 27-25, 25-22) at Nebraska Wesleyan to get to 2-2 in American Rivers Conference action.
In the first set, the Spartans fell behind 7-1 right out of the gate and could never recover, dropping the first set 25-16. UD would score the first three points of the second set to go on to win the set 25-21, without ever trailing.
The team’s continued to alternate early leads with Nebraska Wesleyan getting up three points early in the third, however, this time the Spartans were able to change the narrative and quickly got back to even and gained the lead. The momentum would stay on UD’s side and they would go up by as many as eight in the set. Nebraska Wesleyan battled back and trimmed it the UD lead all the way back down to two at multiple points before finally tying it up again at 24 all but the Spartans would hang on to win 27-25.
Once again the Spartans fell behind early, and once again they came storming back to take the lead at 13-12 to force a Prairie Wolf timeout, before growing the lead to four at 17-13 to force another Nebraska Wesleyan timeout. The Spartans would go on to win the fourth set 25-22 with a little drama as NWU got within two at 24-22 but the Spartans would take the match, 3-1.
Grace Hintze powered the UD attack on Friday night with a game-high 26 kills on 62 attempts with a hitting percentage of .339. Kara Wright was the only other Spartan to reach double figures in kills against Nebraska Wesleyan with 14. UD assisted on 57 of the team's 61 kills, with 52 of the kills coming from Kate Messino.
On the defensive end, Wright, Sarrah Farraday and Rylee Andresen each had one solo block. Four Spartans had at least 20 digs with Grace Strawser leading the way with 28, with Wright and Hintze not far behind with 22 and 21, respectively.
The Spartans are right back on the court on Saturday afternoon when they take on Buena Vista at 1:30 p.m. in Storm Lake, Iowa.
