The first-game jitters were certainly evident as No. 21 Iowa State kicked off the regular season on Aug. 28.

Fortunately for the Cyclones, they weren’t evident for very long.

After falling behind 0-8 to begin the opening set on Friday night, the ISU volleyball team battled back to defeat Dayton in four sets (20-25, 25-22, 25-18, 25-21). The Cyclones were led by freshman Jess Schaben, who notched a team-high eleven kills in her NCAA debut.

Despite Schaben’s successful opener, it took the entire team to recover following its early struggles.

“It was our first set of the season,” said senior libero Caitlin Nolan. “I think we all kind of expected that it wasn’t going to be the prettiest, but I don’t know if we expected it was going to be like that.”

Unlike Dayton who had played earlier in the day against North Dakota, Iowa State hadn’t had a chance to fully get their nerves out of the way before the start of the match, and it showed.

Of the first eight points of the match, all of which were claimed by the Flyers, seven resulted from unforced ISU errors. Inaccurate passes led to sets off of the net, and Dayton capitalized. It wasn’t until a Dayton attacker fell while attempting a kill that the Cyclones notched their first point.

“We were very nervous and discombobulated a little bit [in the first set],” said ISU head coach Christy Johnson-Lynch.

The nerves seemed to flee, however, following the opening set as the Cyclones — with seemingly minimal trouble — claimed the final three sets and the match. And with junior Ciara Capezio exiting after just a few points in the first set, it took more than one standout player to generate that success.

The entire team, led by Nolan, arrived at the realization that the first set did not accurately reflect its true potential, and a change needed to be made.

“We all kind of knew that [the loss in the first set] was on us,” Nolan said. “So we all just came together as a team and said, ‘We need to pick it up,’ and I think that’s what we did.”

That cohesion and team collaboration seemed to manifest itself in the distribution of kills across the Cyclones’ roster. With Capezio out, who led the team in kills with 277 in 2014, multiple ISU attackers picked up the slack — allocating the successful attacks fairly evenly across the board.

Schaben registered eleven kills, redshirt junior Morgan Kuhrt notched nine and upperclassmen Mackenzie Bigbee and Natalie Vondrak each added seven of their own. In addition, as the 6-2 system was utilized, the setting distribution was also fairly balanced. Sophomore Monique Harris led the team with 20 assists with junior Suzanne Horner setting up 14.

After the struggles in the first set, the Cyclones did not have one superstar to rely on to generate a comeback. Instead, the entire team came together.

“Personally, I know I struggled at the beginning, and I knew I had to step it up,” Kuhrt said. “And I think everyone else did that as well.”

Despite the successful outcome, however, the Cyclones still recognize work that needs to be done in order to improve and help eliminate those unforced errors. With teams such as No. 3 Texas and No. 12 Colorado State on the schedule, the early struggles may not fly for long.

In addition, although the 6-2 was utilized against Dayton, formations and rotations — especially with the new freshmen — are yet to be completely figured out. There is still much to figure out for the ISU volleyball team.”

“We’ve got a long way to go,” Johnson-Lynch said. “I didn’t feel great just with the overall feel of [the match], except for maybe defensively. We’re not quite to the point where we’re taking advantage of what we do well.”

Iowa State will look to continue making improvements tomorrow as the Cyclone Invitational continues against North Dakota at 1:30 on Aug. 29 at Hilton Coliseum.