The Lady Orediggers volleyball team extended their current winning streak to 11 games this weekend after winning a five-set thriller against Western New Mexico and a straight-set sweep of New Mexico Highlands.
The opening game of Friday night’s contest against Western New Mexico would set the tone for how the rest of the match would be played: extremely close and competitive throughout. In a game that went to extra points, WNM pulled out the 28-26 win to take the 1-0 lead in the match. The Lady Orediggers would rebound to take the second and third games, both by the score of 25-17, and the match seemed to be in control. However, Western New Mexico fought back to win the fourth game 25-23 and force a decisive fifth game. The final game went down to the wire as well, with CSM prevailing 16-14, taking the match 3-2 in the process.
Saturday’s contest against New Mexico Highlands went much more smoothly for the Lady Orediggers, lasting just over an hour and 15 minutes. CSM completely dominated the opening game, winning 25-11. NMH did not pose much more of a challenge in the second game, as Mines was able to win that one 25-14. The final game of the match proved to be quite difficult, though, as Mines was barely able to eke out the 25-23 win. Close or not, a win is a win, and the third win game would give Mines the match 3-0.
Melanie Wannamaker contributed greatly to the Orediggers’ offensive success with 31 total kills over the weekend, in addition to 26 from Sarah Pekarek and 23 from Alanna Winfield. Defensively, Hannah Margheim provided 44 digs across the weekend’s contests, plus 39 more were added by Danielle Johnson-Hazlewood. Johnson-Hazlewood also contributed 103 assists over the course of the games.
The Oredigger volleyball team will be back in action next weekend as they travel to Chadron State next Friday and Black Hills State next Saturday. The first of those contests starts at 6PM in Chadron on Friday, November 1st, with the second match taking place at 4PM at Black Hills State on Saturday.