ST. CLOUD, Minn. – A magical season continued in championship fashion for Central Oklahoma Saturday evening in the finals of the NCAA Division II Central Regional.
The No. 6-ranked Bronchos pulled out their third straight five-set thriller, rallying past No. 2 St. Cloud State 22-25, 25-22, 13-25, 25-19, 15-9 before 2,514 rowdy Halenbeck Hall fanatics to capture their first-ever regional title.
UCO improved to 33-2 – setting a school-record for wins – in moving on to next week's Elite Eight in Sioux Falls, S.D. The Bronchos ended SCSU's 25-match winning streak and handed the host Huskies (29-3) their only home loss of the season.
"What a three days it's been for these athletes," head coach Edgar Miraku said. "I couldn't be more proud of our girls. Somewhere, somehow, these girls find a way."
The Bronchos are now 6-0 in five-set matches this season, but only the UCO faithful thought this showdown had a chance of getting to that point after SCSU's dominating third-set win.
"I think tonight we had probably the worst set of our season in the third set," Miraku said of the 25-13 setback. "We decided to take some of our starters out to rest, not just physically but mentally. Thankfully they took the rest well and regrouped and we came back."
Central turned it around in the final two sets. After committing 23 errors in the first three sets, the Bronchos had just four in the final two.
Jeanna Karp had four kills and Mikaela Garvin three in the 25-19 fourth-set win that got UCO into familiar territory, then the Bronchos did what they do when the match is on the line – win.
"I told them when we got to the fifth set that it's Central Oklahoma time," Miraku said. And indeed it was.
Sydney Huck had three straight kills to open the fifth set as UCO went up 3-1, but the Huskies came back to take a 5-4 lead. Lari Migliorino tied it with a shot to the corner before teaming with Garvin for a block that put the Bronchos up 6-5.
SCSU tied it at 6-all, then committing two straight errors to put UCO in front to stay. Karp followed those miscues with a slam dunk at the net to make it 9-6 and Garvin's kill off a block sandwiched between two St. Cloud points had the Bronchos with a 10-8 advantage.
It was all UCO after that.
The Bronchos got two kills from Huck and one each from Karp and Addison Wimmer during a 5-1 run that ended the suspense, with an SCSU attack error on match point sending the UCO bench sprinting onto the court in celebration.
"We've had a lot of close matches this year and the way we fight for each other really gets everyone going," Huck said. "We were going into the fifth set and we told each we know a lot about fifth sets and we got this."
"When we went in the fifth set we knew it was ours," Karp said. "We could look back and be like 'wow, we've already been here and already done this before.' We were ready to go."
Huck led UCO's balanced attack with 14 kills to go along with 11 digs and three assisted blocks. Garvin and Karp both had 12 kills and two blocks, while Migliorino and Wimmer chipped 10 apiece. Migliorino added five assisted blocks.
Lindsey Houran had 43 assists directing the offensive attack while adding 14 digs and three service aces. Katie Le dug up 24 attacks from the hard-hitting Huskies, with Riley Roberts collecting 11.
UCO led most of the first set before the Huskies overcame a 20-16 deficit with a 9-2 run to take the early lead in the match.
The Bronchos overcame a series of early deficits to even the match with the key second-set victory. UCO trailed 12-9, but a Wimmer kill, SCSU error and Houran ace tied it.
It was deadlocked again four more times before Central finally took the lead for good at 22-21 on a combined block by Huck and Migliorino. An SCSU error made it 23-21 and the Huskies scored to get within 23-22, but Garvin's tip kill and a Roberts ace ended it.
Nothing went right for UCO in the third set. The Bronchos fell behind 9-1 and committed 10 attack errors in the lopsided loss.
But UCO responded with the clutch fourth-set triumph, setting the stage for yet another fantastic finish.
