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Fairmont blasts New Ulm in Big South Volleyball

Staff photo by Steve Muscatello New Ulm’s Ashlyn Donner spikes the ball past Andrea Westcott of Fairmont Tuesday at New Ulm High School. For more photos of this event go to cu.nujournal.com

NEW ULM — The New Ulm Eagles volleyball team failed to get its first win on the season loosing to Fairmont 14-25, 25-21, 26-24, 25-18 in a Big South Conference battle Tuesday night.

New Ulm (0-8) broke a 4-4 tie early in the first set to take the lead and open an 11-6 run. The Eagles kept the lead the entire set only letting the Cardinals within two still early in the set.

The Eagles widened the lead to 21-12 assisted by kills from Ellie Bute and two ace serves from Nora Windschill and winning the set 25-14.

“We played really well the first set — we talked about coming out and being aggressive and saw some things we could do to pick Fairmont apart and we did that,” New Ulm coach Zach Hansen said.

New Ulm broke a 5-point deficit to tie the second set 18-18 when Olivia Wick dropped a kill from the outside for the tying point. Fairmont recorded six kills in the last eight points with one service error point awarded to New Ulm as Fairmont won 25-21 to tie the match at 1-1.

“We had come out aggressive and then things turn when you give any team the ability to do what they want to do then their net play gets better,” Hansen said.

New Ulm’s Bute recorded four consecutive ace serves as the Eagles knotted the third set at 8-8. The Eagles then tallied two kills and an ace serve from Elizabeth Wolkow to retake the lead at 15-13 before a kill from the Cardinals middle hitter slowed the progress.

“I thought we served very strongly overall, a couple inopportune misses but overall very good serving,” Hansen said.

Kills and hitting errors from both sides again tied the match at 24-24 and it took extra points in the third set before Fairmont could edge New Ulm 26-24. The final two points from Fairmont were awarded by hitting errors from the New Ulm side of the court.

“We talked a lot about how we handle diversity in sets 2, 3 and 4 we played really well. We play better than an 0-8 team and we are waiting for that moment,” Hansen said.

The Eagles again had a lead in the middle of the fourth set before the Cardinals could tally a 10-0 run and a lead in their favor at 20-13. New Ulm’s front hitters faced five kills and one blocked point during Fairmont’s scoring run before losing the set 25-18 and the 3-1 victory to the Cardinals.

New Ulm’s Madeline Gag tallied five kills and five blocks, Bute had 12 set assists with four kills and seven ace serves and libero Sarah Longtin had eights digs.

New Ulm will travel on Thursday at 7 p.m. to Waseca for a Big South Conference match.

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