Sam Thiel/Winonan

Concordia-St. Paul University had a strong hitting percentage of .443, Thursday in St. Paul, as the No. 2 Golden Bears defeated the Winona State University volleyball team 3-0.

Rachel Polland led the way offensively for the Warriors, recording 12 kills while hitting .333. Katie Froehle put in nine kills while Bekah Saugen led the defensive effort with 15 digs. Elena Kruesel dished out 15 assists for WSU while Kaley Jacobson contributed 11.

WSU lost the opening set 25-12, while the Golden Bears added 25-17 and 25-16 wins to finish off the sweep.

The Warriors are now 18-9 overall on the season and 10-7 in NSIC play.

Katie Froehle and Kayla Uhlenhake each had double-doubles as the Winona State University volleyball team defeated the No. 20 Minnesota State University Mavericks 3-2 for its second victory over a ranked opponent this season.

Froehle recorded 16 kills and 23 digs while Uhlenhake dished out 31 assists and added 12 digs in the victory.

The game was a grudge match throughout the entire night, with the Warriors winning the opening set 25-23. The Mavericks would come back to tie up the match with a 25-22 victory in the third set to go up 2-1 in the match.

MSU would then earn a 25-19 victory in the fourth set, but Winona State would put the match away with a 15-12 victory in the final fifth set. The Warriors broke an 11-11 tie by winning four of the next five points.

Rachel Polland recorded kills on back-to-back plays, while Bekah Saugen added a service ace to put the Warriors one point closer to winning the match. Polland had one last final on the next play to give Winona State the upset victory.

“Well, first off on Thursday we only played three games versus Saturday we played five games, which gave us the opportunity to get more kills and assists. But overall we passed better on Saturday which allowed us to run our offense better. It was a lot more difficult for Mankato to defend us when we established our middle and right sides early on into the match,” said junior Bekah Saugen. “As the regular season comes to a close we need to work on overall consistency. For example, we make a run we can’t afford to have mental errors and give our opponents a chance to come back. Saturday was really exciting because we didn’t have just a few players contributing offensively, everyone was doing well.”

The victory marked the second over a ranked squad by WSU this season, who beat No. 18 Wayne State on Sept. 14. Winona State has four wins over ranked teams in the past two years.

Polland led the offensive effort with 17 kills and hit .351. Kate Horihan contributed 12 kills and had a hitting percentage of .348 while recording seven block assists. Maggie Finkel collected 21 digs for WSU as Saugen had 17. Kaley Jacobson dished out 22 assists in the match for the Warriors.

Winona State University is now 19-9 overall on the season and 11-7 in NSIC play. The squad will finish the regular season next weekend with home matches against Augustana on Nov. 9 and Wayne State University on Nov. 10.

Contact Sam at [email protected]