Coyotes sweep NDSU over weekend series

The USD (5-1) volleyball team faced off against the North Dakota State (4-4) Bison inside the Sanford Coyote Sports Center Sunday night. The Coyotes came away with a win after four sets 26-24, 25-19, 24-26, 27-25. This match is the first in a two-day series inside the SCSC. The matchup is a pink out game in honor of breast cancer awareness. 

The match was a back and forth effort for the Coyotes and Bison with 29 ties and 12 lead changes throughout the night. The final set saw the Coyotes fight back from a 23-19 deficit to win the contest. South Dakota moves 5-4 overall and 4-1 in the Summit League

Sophomore outside hitter Elizabeth Juhnke produced 23 kills and senior teammate outside hitter Sami Slaughter had 11 kills. Sophomore outside hitter Aimee Adams had her first collegiate double-double with 10 kills and 15 digs. Sophomore middle blocker Madison Harms saw 11 block assists against the Bison, a school record. 

Senior Madison Jurgens alos had a double-double with 47 assists and 14 digs while defensive specialist Lolo Weideman contributed 25 digs, a career high. 

“I think we learned our lesson from last weekend,” Harms said about the team’s Omaha loss. “Every team is going to come in here and want to beat us and I think mentally we just have to get used to that. The second day has more fatigue involved which means we just have to be more disciplined.”

The Coyotes maintained that discipline and fought off the Bison during night two of the series with a 3-0 sweep Monday night.

USD easily found their momentum, winning the first set 25-14 then closing out the match 25-16 and 25-23.

Junior middleblcoker Maddie Wiedenfeld saw a Coyote personal best 13 kills and hit .500 in the match.

Juhnke and Slaughter had 12 and seven kills respectively.

USD travels to Brookings for a two game set Sunday at 5 p.m. inside Frost Arena and will play match two at 7 p.m. Monday.