Seniors night ends in loss

The Husky volleyball team came up short this weekend losing to MSU Moorhead and University of Minnesota, Crookston.

On Friday night, the Huskies looked to entertain the Dragons (10-6 NSIC, 20-9 overall) at home but lost in three straight sets 27-25, 25-19 and 25-22.

Notables for the game included senior outside hitter Kristen Stott and sophomore middle hitter Erica Beacom who each had nine kills in the match. Beacom lead the team with a .269 attacking percentage.

Freshman middle hitter Taylor Beebe had eight kills and four block assists for the Huskies with Ashley Shield contributing five kills and four blocks as well.

Freshman Lauren Clipperly continued the setting responsibilities with Kiersten Mormann out with an ankle injury. Clipperly set up 27 assists in the three set loss. Sophomore libero Chelsea Nagle had 23 digs defensively with freshman Sarah Madden adding 16 digs and Stott with 10 digs.

The Huskies continued their weekend against the Golden Eagles on Senior Night Saturday evening. Seniors included Stott, Stephanie Coxon and Alecia Lunde.

The Huskies battled back and forth always trying to fight their way back into the game starting down in every set except for the fourth set. The Huskies fell to the Golden Eagles (3-14 NSIC, 6-23 overall) 25-22, 17-25, 22-25, 25-15, 15-11 bringing their record to 3-16 NSIC, 7-24 overall.

“What can I say,” said head coach Patricia Gerchy (Mickow). “We start the match slow and had to try and fight our way back through the whole match. The girls are facing tons of adversity from all kinds of things. I am getting what I can out of the girls.

“We work on everything continually. We mentally try to prepare the girls as much as possible. We have to find the flow through our team.”

In the first set, the Huskies were down early in the set 4-11, but rallied back and forth to tie the game at 15-15. Madden served five straight points to give the Huskies a strong enough lead to win the first set.

The Huskies then started off the second set trailing 4-8. Fighting back and forth, the Huskies couldn’t find a rhythm in the second set and fell.

The third set, like the second, started out with a deficit.

The Huskies came back to tie the game at 17-17, but with an attacking error and an ace by the Golden Eagles, they soon found themselves to be ahead again.

The only set where the Huskies showed complete domination of the game was the fourth set. The Huskies started out early with explosive offensive attacks to ensure a fifth set.

“Usually we lose the match towards the middle of the set,” Gerchy (Mickow) said. “Unfortunately that is where we are at. We are trying to find ways to break this pattern.”

Once again the Huskies started out slow and found themselves behind 5-2. With the same story plaguing the Huskies all night, they fought their way back into contention down by only one point at 8-7. The Huskies couldn’t get a step ahead of the Golden Eagles and lost the fifth set 15-11.

“We gave it what we had,” Coxon said. “We played hard and we had some errors. We step onto the court every night to walk away with no regrets.”

Kayla Tschida, who sat the game Friday night, led the way in the front row with a season high 21 kills. Stott recorded her second doubledouble this season with 10 digs and 13 kills.

Libero Nagle had 26 digs next to her name on the stat sheet while Coxon and Madden had 14 digs and 13 digs respectively.

St. Cloud State has one more game in the regular season taking on two-time defending champions and undefeated Concordia-St. Paul Golden Bears at 4 p.m. in SCSU’s Halenbeck Hall.

“We are going to give it our best shot,” Gerchy (Mickow) said. “That is why we play the game. We are going to keep fighting and working hard.”