Nebraska Wesleyan had a match point opportunity but three straight kills from Dordt College gave the Defenders a 16-14 fifth set victory and the 3-2 victory over the Prairie Wolves in a thrilling GPAC volleyball match on Saturday (Sept. 22) in Sioux Center, Iowa.

The Defenders held on winning in scores of 25-19, 19-25, 25-21, 23-25, 16-14. NWU falls to 6-6 overall and 1-3 in the GPAC.

Nebraska Wesleyan had seven errors in the first set while Dordt had 16 kills to easily take the 1-0 advantage in the match.

Set two was full of errors for Dordt as the Defenders had 12 attack errors with a -.103 percentage. The Prairie Wolves led 19-18, then five consecutive Dordt errors gave NWU a match point. Cicely Batie ended the set with a kill for the 25-19 win.

In set three, Dordt broke open a 13-13 tie and never trailed again. With the score 16-15, two NWU errors and two Dordt kills made the advantage too much to overcome for NWU.

The fourth set was very close with no team holding more than a three point advantage. NWU led 24-21 with three set points and finally finished the set with a kill by Katelyn Walsh.

Deciding set five was the closest of all five sets as neither team led by more than two points. Dordt led 13-11, but a kill by Batie and back-to-back attack errors from the Defenders put NWU up 14-13. Kills by Katelyn Schuller and Danae Geels put Dordt up 15-14, then a kill from Loy Sahr finished the match.

Nebraska Wesleyan finished with 54 kills and a .172 attack percentage. Cicely Batie had a big match with 15 kills and just one error on 26 attempts. She also had four blocks. Katelyn Walsh had a double-double of 12 kills, 16 digs, while Karney Kuehl had 10 digs. Alex Springman dished out 47 assists with 15 digs for a double-double.

Katelyn Schuller led the Defenders with 18 kills.