GOLDEN, Colo. - #5 Concordia-St. Paul (1-1) opened the 2024 season with a 5-set win over Missouri Western State (0-1) on Friday afternoon at the Oredigger Classic at Lockridge Arena on the campus of Colorado School of Mines, followed by a 3-1 defeat to #17 Colorado Mesa in the nightcap.

Concordia survived a scare in the opener, dropping the first set 25-21 before a 25-20 second set win to even the match, then fell behind with a 28-26 third set defeat, rallying to win the final two sets 25-20 and 15-9.

In match two, CSP fell into an 0-2 hole before ultimately falling in a tightly played fourth set (16-25, 18-25, 25-18, 26-28) with the Mavericks.

The Golden Bears will face Regis (Colo.) on Saturday at 11 a.m. and Gannon (Pa.) on Saturday at 4 p.m. on court one.

Senior Emma Schmidt became CSP's eighth member of the 1,000 career kills and 1,000 career digs club, as she reached 1,000 career kills in the day's first match, the 23rd player in program history to achieve the 1,000 career kills milestone. She had a strong all-around performance in the opener, with 17 kills and a new career-high with 26 digs. She finished the day with 25 kills and 33 digs in the two matches.

Claudia Stahlke led the middles offensively with a strong performance, terminating a career-high 16 kills on 29 error-free swings to hit .552 in match one while adding nine blocks (two solos) defensively. She followed it up with another big effort with 10 kills (.348) and nine blocks in the finale to combine for 26 kills and 18 blocks.

Ellie Sieling matched Schmidt's 17 kills (a new career-high) in the opener, adding a double-double with 13 digs.

Senior setter Teagan Starkey paced CSP's offense to a .244 team hitting percentage with 71 kills while delivering 65 assists, as all five hitters had at least nine kills. She chipped in four blocks at the net. She added 36 assists against CMU.

CSP's libero, Cassie Sieling, had a career-high 20 digs against MWSU before adding 15 more against CMU.

MATCH 1: CSP 3, MWSU 2
CSP held a 14-8 blocking advantage and a 71-56 edge in kills while limiting the Griffons to a .137 team hitting percentage.

The first set opened with 11 ties and five lead changes, setting the tone for a match that would feature 33 ties and 14 lead changes throughout. MWSU broke an 11-11 tie by scoring eight of the next 10 points to establish a 19-13 advantage, with all 11 ties and five lead changes occurring in the first 11 points of the opening set.

In the second, Concordia flipped an early 2-1 deficit by scoring five straight points on Cassie Sieling's serve with Mehlayna Straub providing back-to-back kills followed by teaming up with Schmidt on a block. The 5-0 spurt gave CSP a lead they would not relinquish, although an 18-12 advantage nearly evaporated as MWSU clawed back to make it a 19-18 CSP lead before the Golden Bears closed with a 6-2 run to even the match.

The third was another tightly played set with nine ties and five lead changes with Concordia grabbing the early momentum with a 5-2 lead. The lead was expanded to five points twice (12-7 and 13-8) before Missouri Western rallied to take an 18-17 lead, the first of five lead changes in the set. The Griffons would ultimately claim the set with three straight points to erase CSP's 26-25 set point lead.

The fourth set would also featured seven ties and a pair of lead changes with MWSU's 12-11 lead nearing the midway point of a potential match-deciding set reversed by five straight CSP points on Schmidt's serve as the Griffons fell out of system with three attacking errors during the five-point CSP burst.

CSP never let the Griffons back in the set, holding at least a three-point lead the rest of the way to send it to a fifth set.

Set five featured four more ties and one lead change with MWSU getting the early momentum with a 3-1 lead. CSP would force ties at 1-1, 3-3, and 4-4 before the final tie at 5-5 as Concordia's 5-4 deficit turned into a 10-5 lead behind Schmidt's tough serve, this time with Ellie Sieling finding the floor with three-straight kills for an 8-5 lead with back-to-back blocks involving Straub (one with Starkey, the other with Ellie Sieling) pushing the lead to 10-5. Concordia held at least a four-point lead the rest of the match, closing it out with a 15-9 fifth set.

The Griffons were led by Emily Loy's match-high 20 kills while Holly Holdt had a 13-kill, 15-dig double-double and Nessa Johnson also added a double-double with 42 assists and 11 digs.

Concordia improves to 2-0 all-time against the Griffons, both on neutral floors, also securing an NCAA Central Region win over MWSU in 2017 in Marshall, Minnesota. Concordia has won its last four season opening matches dating back to a 3-2 loss to Hillsdale (Mich.) at a neutral site in Florida in 2019. Concordia is 18-3 in season openers under head coach Brady Starkey, who began his tenure with the program in 2003.

MATCH 2: CMU 3, CSP 1
The late game momentum from the afternoon match didn't carry over to the evening match as CSP dropped the first two sets 25-16 and 25-18. Concordia did lead early, starting the match up 3-1 but the 17th-ranked Mavericks responded by claiming a 10-6 lead and didn't look back in securing the first set win over the fifth-ranked Golden Bears.

CMU hit .467 in the opening set, holding CSP to a .182 hitting line.

The second set started close as nine ties and six lead changes occurred in the first half of the set, with CSP leading 13-12 before a 12-0 Maverick run gave CMU set point with a 24-13 lead before CSP came back with five straight points led by freshman Makenna Nold making her debut. After delivering her first career kill, she took hold of the serve, leading to four more points including an ace.

Nold's insertion into the lineup came at the right time for Concordia, who needed a spark, and the Jamestown, North Dakota native delivered, picking up four kills in the third set with a .429 hitting percentage, while Claudia Stahlke took control in the middle with four kills on five swings and four blocks.

Three of Nold's four kills in the set came after CSP broke an 11-11 tie with a 7-0 run, helping to put the set away to keep CSP in the match.

In set four, Colorado Mesa looked to take the match momentum back, scoring seven of the first 10 points before building a 10-6 lead.

But with CSP trailing nearing the midway mark of the potential deciding set, Nold helped the team rally once again, getting a kill to make it 11-9, another for a 13-12 lead, and another for a 14-13 lead. Her ace capped off a 7-1 scoring spurt that put Concordia ahead 16-13 looking to send the match to a fifth set.

Once again, the Mavericks would rally, taking an 18-15 deficit and turning it into a 21-18 lead with a 6-0 scoring run. CMU would put match point on the Golden Bears, 24-21 when Emma Schmidt revived the offense with a kill, followed by another from Nold to bring CSP within a point, 24-23.

Schmidt would team up with Teagan Starkey for a block to tie the set at 24, with Nold following with a solo block for the lead. Nold produced another kill for a 26-25 lead, when the Mavericks put together a string of three consective points to secure the match.

Nold would finish her college debut with 10 kills and one error, hitting .562 on 16 swings while competing in two and a half sets.

Overall, the match consisted of 26 ties and 14 lead changes, with CSP holding CMU to a -.067 attack percentage in the third set (9-11-30) with the Golden Bears hitting .360 (12-3-25) to get back into the match.

The Mavericks were led by Sydney Leffler's match-high 20 kills while two others, Sierra Hunt and Nicole Martin, each had 10 kills. Allison Waller had a match-high 19 digs for CMU.

Colorado Mesa secured its first win against Concordia, with CSP holding a 2-1 record, defeating Mesa State (as it was known in 2007) in three sets and CMU in four sets in 2014. All three meetings have been played in Colorado and on neutral courts in September.