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University of Nebraska - Kearney Athletics

Jensen Rowse
MIAA
1
Pittsburg St. PittSt 17-14,10-10 Mid-America Intercollegiate
3
Winner Neb.-Kearney UNK 28-4,16-4 Mid-America Intercollegiate
Pittsburg St. PittSt
17-14,10-10 Mid-America Intercollegiate
1
Final
3
Neb.-Kearney UNK
28-4,16-4 Mid-America Intercollegiate
Winner
Set Scores
Team 1 2 3 4 F
Pittsburg St. PittSt 30 17 16 19 (1)
Neb.-Kearney UNK 28 25 25 25 (3)

Game Recap: Volleyball |

Lopers Back in the MIAA Tourney Finals

Kearney, Neb. – Outside hitter Emersen Cyza had 20 kills and 12th-ranked Nebraska Kearney recorded nine blocks and served up nine aces to beat Pittsburg State in four sets (28-30, -17, -16, -19) Friday night in a MIAA Tournament semifinal match in St. Joseph, Mo.

The second-seeded Lopers (28-4) advance to Saturday's championship match at 6 p.m. against 20th-ranked and fifth-seed Washburn (22-8). The Ichabods, who swept the season series from UNK, downed top-seed Northwest Missouri tonight in four sets. They upset fourth-seed and 21st-ranked Central Oklahoma in five sets on Thursday. Rhianna Wilhelm

To beat the Gorillas (17-14) for a third time this season, UNK had to overcome a tough 30-28 loss in the opening stanza. That set featured seven ties and four lead changes with the Lopers rallying from holes of 7-2, 14-8 and 18-15 to lead 24-22. A 9-4 run was capped with a kill from middle Bailee Sterling (Kearney) and put UNK at set point but Pitt countered by scoring the next three. The teams went back and forth before Pitt used a kill and block to grab a 1-0 lead on the scoreboard.

"We got off to a terrible start and some of that was Pitt came to play. They were a fired-up team and taking on that whole Cinderella mentality. They attacked us from the service line and we probably played a little tight. We came back but did everything we could not to win that set," said UNK head coach Rick Squiers on the KRVN Radio post-game show.

UNK, however, trailed only two more times the rest of the way as they hit .320 in set two, .371 in the third and .262 in the fourth. Meanwhile, Pitt had 21 of its 50 kills in set one and hit just .157 overall. The Lopers almost hit 100 points higher (.253).

"We reminded our team to settle in, that we're doing plenty of things well and we've had success running our offense against them. When we stop scoring points for them we'll be okay. We scored less from that from that point (second set) forward," said Squiers.

Cyza (Alliance) reached her kill count in 45 attempts (.378 pct.) while also having both of UNK's solo blocks. Five others had at least two stuffs including four from middle Fallon Stutheit (Johnson). Next, Sterling (12) and Kansas outside Asha Regier (14) had double digit kill totals with Sterling at a match-high .417. Finally, Minden libero Jensen Rowse had four aces, 12 digs and a .957 serve receive percentage with North Platte setter Peyton Neff providing 50 assists, 15 digs, three block assists, two kills and an ace.

"Offensively we got a pretty consistent effort from our middles especially once we got up and running. Emersen is going to get a lot of attention out there; she's going to face two blockers most of the time. So, it's big when we have our middles be able to score," said Squiers. "Generally you would take nine aces with six (service) errors but the timing of those errors was a head scratcher. We come out of a timeout and have an error … that's a no-no in volleyball."

The Gorillas were led by Janae Thurston (12 kills, 18 digs) and Meg Auten (13 kills, nine digs).
 
 
 
 
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