The ISU volleyball team came within one game of upsetting No. 24 Missouri but fell to the Tigers 3-2 in a hard fought match at Hilton Coliseum on Saturday. The scoring in game one was close throughout with neither team taking a commanding lead.

Down 15-10, Iowa State used consecutive kills by Brittany Dalager, Sara Stribe and Ashlie McWee to shorten the Tiger lead to 15-13. Another run of three unanswered Cyclone points evened the score at 17. Again the scoring remained close. With the Tigers at game point

29-28, Iowa State scored two points to take the lead 30-29, but Missouri came back with two of its own to retake the lead 31-30. The Cyclones scored the next three points and took the game, 33-31.

“I thought our kids did a great job coming out and competing,” ISU head coach Linda Crum said. “In game one, they really came out, competed and really forced Missouri into a situation that we were

tied at 26, and that we put enough pressure on Missouri to see what they would do under that pressure with us pushing a lead. It really forced them to make some hitting errors and really put them in a situation where we were the aggressor. We were the one taking advantage, and they were the ones responding to us.” Missouri jumped out to an early 9-3 lead in game two. The Tigers kept the lead but at 27-15, the Cyclones scored six-straight points to push the score to 27-21, forcing Missouri to take a time-out. Missouri came out of the timeout and responded, winning the game

30-25.

“At the end of game two we had that big deficit in terms of a point spread,” Crum said. “We came back. We did some really good things. And that really gave us the momentum heading into game three.” Game three featured back and forth scoring and the game remained tight until a McWee kill, a McWee block and a Dalager kill put Iowa State up 25-21. Missouri called a time-out and came back and scored a point, but the Cyclones took advantage of five straight points, after one from Missouri, to win the game, 30-22. Crum said the team had set a goal to be 1-1 when they went into

intermission and they did that. She said they had another goal after intermission. “Our goal when we came out of intermission was to beat Missouri in that third game and go into game four and go after the win,” Crum said.

Iowa State was competitive in game four but fell 30-25, pushing the match to a fifth and deciding game, with the first to 15 getting the win. Missouri jumped out to a 6-3 lead, but both teams battled to a 12-11 score, with Iowa State staying in the match with a Renae Pruess kill

late in the game. The Tigers finished out the game and the match by scoring three straight points, giving them a 15-11 win. The loss dropped Iowa State to 10-19 overall and 1-16 in the Big 12 Conference, while Missouri improved to 22-6 overall and 11-5 in league play.

“In our last game we became more tentative. We just weren’t being very aggressive,” ISU senior Mandi Harms said. “We had a few misserves we didn’t need there at the end of the game. During a rally match, a misserve is a big deal. When those things happen, we get in a slump and it takes away our momentum.” Momentum seemed to be on Iowa State’s side at the end of game two, through game three and into game four. Harms said having good communication and keeping the same intensity throughout the entire match even if an error was made was a key. “When bad things start to happen, everyone gets quiet. That is when we need to be the loudest,” Harms said. “Good things happen when we are very loud, but we need to make sure we maintain that throughout the match.”

Harms led the Cyclones with 19 kills and 18 digs. Pruess and McWee each added 15 and 10 kills, while Dalager recorded 16 kills and 26 digs in the match. Sara Stribe paced the offense with 46 assists. “Brittany played a very solid match for us,” Crum said. “With as many digs as she had, she kept us in a lot of plays and gave us the chance to really go after it and really score.” Iowa State will remain at home for a match against Texas on Wednesday at 7 p.m.