Women's Volleyball | 11/11/2025 3:17:00 PM

#TIDBITS

Golden Eagle volleyball is back at home to close out the 2025 season with a pair of matches against ranked opponents in No. 11 St. Cloud State and No. 23 Minnesota State. It's fitting that the Golden Eagles will play ranked opponents to close out the season. It was seemingly every weekend in conference play that the Golden Eagles played at least one ranked opponent. The Golden Eagles will also have their senior day on Saturday afternoon after their match with the Mavericks where they will honor their lone senior, Dana Melby.

·   CELEBRATING DANA. This weekend, the Golden Eagles will honor their lone senior in Dana Melby. Melby played basketball for a year for the Golden Eagles before playing volleyball for the last three seasons and started her first season as a Golden Eagle and has played in every match this season in her final go round as a Golden Eagle. Much like a season ago when the Golden Eagles had just one senior on senior day, Melby will celebrate her senior day all by her lonesome.

·   TRY FOR ONE AT HOME. 'Home cooking' hasn't necessarily applied to the Golden Eagles in recent years. This season, the Golden Eagles are winless in eight tries this season inside the friendly confines of Lysaker Gymnasium and dating back to 2021, the maroon and gold have five wins at home, with three of them coming in 2022. Minnesota Crookston will hope for some magic this weekend to close out the season this weekend, which would result in a massive upset or two.

·   NEW WATERMARK. It's been a tough conference season for the Golden Eagles, but with anything, you can find a silver lining fairly easily. In this case, the silver lining is a new career high for Carizma Muth. The redshirt sophomore set a new career high last weekend in kills in a season, sitting at 230 with two more matches to go. Muth finished last season with 228 kills on the year and has had a really nice year, sitting in second on her team in a number of offensive categories. The third year Golden Eagle from Wisconsin has seven double-doubles on the season, as well, which also ties a career high in a season.

·  COULD THE HOME SCHEDULE BE ANY HARDER? The maroon and gold will wrap-up their home schedule this weekend against another pair of ranked opponents. Whatever adjective you want to use for the quality of opponents the Golden Eagles have seen in Crookston this year, odds are that it would be the right one. Including this weekend, the Golden Eagles will have played nine opponents with a winning record and six of those opponents have been either ranked or receiving votes in the national polls at some time this season.

• CUT DOWN ON THE ERRORS. Obviously it's easier said than done, but Minnesota Crookston would love to cut down on the errors in conference play. The maroon and gold in their first eight matches outside of conference play had just 141 attacking errors, with 30 of those coming in one match. In their first eight matches, they had just 17 errors per match. In conference play, they're averaging right around 20 errors per match, which in this conference, is no recipe for success.

·   QUALITY OFFENSE AGAINST QUALITY OPPONENTS. Minnesota Crookston played a quality match against perennial power Concordia-St. Paul, albeit in a loss. The Golden Eagles, speaking of errors, had just eight errors in the match against the Golden Bears, which was their lowest in a match against the Golden Bears dating back to 2012.

• ROAD ENDS HERE. For a season that started on the East Coast, it will now end in the Midwest. The Golden Eagles got off to their best start in over a decade with a 6-2 record. Although the season ends this weekend, the Golden Eagles have a number of returners that they can rely on next season, which believe it or not, will be here before we know it.

Series Quick Look vs the opponents
SCSU is 21-8 all-time against the Golden Eagles
MSU is 21-4 against the Golden Eagles

How to Follow

No. 9 St. Cloud State @ Minnesota Crookston
Friday, Nov. 14
6 P.M.
Crookston, Minn. / Lysaker Gymnasium
Live Stats -- https://goldeneaglesports.com/sidearmstats/wvball/summary
Watch Live -- https://nsicnetwork.com/goldeneaglesports/

No. 23 Minnesota State @ Minnesota Crookston
Saturday, Nov. 15
2 P.M.
Crookston, Minn. / Lysaker Gymnasium
Live Stats -- https://goldeneaglesports.com/sidearmstats/wvball/summary
Watch Live -- https://nsicnetwork.com/goldeneaglesports/

#OPPONENTOUTLOOK

ST. CLOUD STATE. The Huskies are having another really nice season. After making the elite eight a season ago, SCSU could make a case for another deep NCAA Tournament run. SCSU is 21-6 on the year and have won eight out of their last nine matches.

DOMINATED THE DOGS. In their win over Minnesota Duluth last Friday night, the Huskies controlled the match against their rivals. SCSU defeated then-No. 25 Minnesota Duluth in three sets, including a dominating second set victory over UMD, 25-9. SCSU showed what they can do against anybody in the nation.

ONE STAR TO THE NEXT. You'd think that the Huskies losing Kenzie Foley, one of the best players in the nation due to graduation, would have a drop off offensively. That hasn't been the case with Ella Thompson. Although Thompson isn't putting up Foley-like numbers, she is still having a fantastic season with over 300 kills and an attacking percentage of .325, which ranks 11th in the conference.

MINNESOTA STATE. Minnesota State is having a really nice season and could be an exceptionally dangerous team to play in the NSIC playoffs. Minnesota State is 21-5 on the season and have won four matches in a row, all of which have been sweeps.

ACES WILD. A big part of MSU's success this season has been their ability to win the service line more often than not. MSU leads the conference in aces per set with 2.51 and ranks third in the nation in that same category. The Mavericks have three players that rank in the top-10 in aces per set in the conference. MSU has 10 matches this season with more than 10 aces in a match, including 16 aces in their three-set win over UMary.

MULTITUDE OF WAYS. When MSU isn't getting a service ace, they still have a variety of attackers that can find the floor. MSU has four attackers this season with more than 200 total kills, led by Avery Klein and her 250 total kills. Mary Satori, Avery Rosenberg and Emily Kern join Klein in giving the Mavericks one of the best offenses in the entire conference.