The Metro women’s volleyball season came to an abrupt end Nov. 21 against No. 1 NCAA-ranked Concordia-St. Paul; on a 70-match winning streak, in the NCAA Central Region championship match. The women’s team ended the season with an incredible record of 26-8, winning the last 13-of-14 matches.

The match began with a slow start in the first set, trailing early 6-1. But the ’Runners quickly found a groove to cut the lead to 17-16 after three straight kills from outside hitter Emily Greenhalgh, middle blocker Julie Causseaux, and outside hitter Bri Morley.

Concordia quickly regrouped, taking a 20-17 lead but Metro fired back — scoring five of the next six points to cut the lead to 22-21. Concordia, after a timeout, came back and forced two attack errors on their way to a 25-23 victory.

CCU outside hitter Brooke Whittmayer hits the ball past Metro middle blocker Anna Mapes (left), and outside hitter Emily Greenhalgh (right), Nov. 7 in Lakewood. The Roadrunners lost to Concordia-St. Paul Nov. 21 in the regional championship in Minnesota. File photo by Taryn Jones • tjone101@mscd.edu

The second set was even-keeled with the score 14-12 midway through until Concordia caught fire, scoring the next four-of-five points to make the score 18-13. Metro fired back sporadically, but was unable to catch up as Concordia scored the last four-of-five points for the 25-17 victory.

The final set was dominated by the Golden Bears with Metro scoring almost minimally for a final set score of 25-15 for the match victory.

Metro hit a .171, while CSPU hit a .352. Morley had 11 kills and seven digs; setter Gabe Curtis served up 26 assists, seven digs, four kills and two blocks. Libero Amy Watanabe backed them up with a match-high 18 digs.

“We are very optimistic,” Head coach Debbie Hendricks said about next year. “We are obviously going to miss those three seniors a lot. They each bring very special qualities to our team, and contributed a lot to our success this year.”

Metro started the playoffs on a roll beating two top-15 teams in a row, proving to onlookers they deserved to be ranked among the best in the nation. They began with a five-match win over Southwest Minnesota University Nov. 19th in St. Paul, Minn.

The team continued their hot streak with a win over their next top-15 ranked opponent, Minnesota Duluth, in three sets. The women held Duluth to an .088 hitting percentage while hitting .278.

Watanabe ended her last match with 18 digs making her the match leader, and Curtis ended the match with 26 assists, seven digs, four kills, and two blocks.

Middle blocker Anna Mapes, who did not play against Concordia, set a new Metro single season-high hitting percentage, hitting at .396 on the season.

Watanabe stands as Metro’s all-time digs leader with 1,640 career digs. Curtis took the second all-time in assists with 3,331 in her career at Metro, and fifth in assists per set at 10.96.

“Its an honor,” Watanabe said. “It shows that all your hard work and commitment to the program pays off eventually.”

Metro also had four players named to the Central Region All-Tournament Team, which were Watanabe, Curtis, Morley and Causseaux.