LARAMIE, Wyo. (Sept. 7, 2019) – The Wyoming women's volleyball team picked up its first come-from-behind victory of the season and fourth consecutive win Saturday night in a thrilling five-set victory over Northern Colorado in the finale of the UniWyo Invite.
After dropping the first two sets 25-22 and 25-18, the Cowgirls (4-2) responded with resiliency by winning the final three sets, 25-23, 25-23 and 15-8.
"When you play a team like Northern Colorado, who's really good and has a great coaching staff, they do some phenomenal things and execute well, you've got to bring your A game when you play them," said head coach Chad Callihan.
"But I am really proud of our team. I'm proud of their effort. I'm proud of the subs that we brought in, they got some things going there for us. I thought by the end of the match we looked really comfortable and playing Wyoming Volleyball again."
Halie McArdle was one of those subs and she came on to tally a team- and season-high 18 kills in the victory while also hitting a phenomenal .459. KC McMahon and Jackie McBride were also in double-figure kills as they notched 16 and 12, respectively. Both McMahon and McBride were named to the all-tournament team with McBride receiving MVP honors.
McBride didn't just do it offensively in the win, she also sparked the Cowgirls defense with a match-high seven total (three solo, four assisted) blocks. As a team, Wyoming recorded 12 blocks while Northern Colorado (4-2) had just six. The Pokes had six aces in the win to the Bears' five while both teams had nine service errors. For the match, Wyoming hit .248 as a team while UNC was at .237.
After getting out-hit by the Bears in the first two sets, as UNC hit .500 and .387 in sets one and two, respectively, the Cowgirls hit much better than Northern Colorado the last three sets.
"A couple of substitutions there in set three and some scheme changes and things started to go our way a little bit there in the last few sets," said Callihan.
Wyoming hit .270 and .244 in its sets three and four victory while holding UNC to under .200 each and although the Pokes hit just .043 in the deciding fifth, they held the Bears to a negative .154 clip in the end.
Joining McBride and McMahon on the all-tournament team was Mackenzie Coates who was stellar on the night, recording a career-high 56 assists to go along with eight digs and a pair of blocks. Madi Fields, who passed Jodi Purdy tonight for second-place on the all-time career digs list, led the way with a match-best 19 digs while Hailey Zuroske chipped in with 10.
The Cowgirls will return to the road this weekend for their second-to-last non-conference tournament as they travel to Vermillion, S.D., for the South Dakota Classic. The Pokes will face Iowa and host-school USD Friday before closing the tournament with UC Davis.
-WYO-
