STEPHENVILLE, Texas – MSU Denver's reward for going across town and knocking off Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference regular-season champion Colorado School of Mines in the conference tournament semifinals?
 
The opportunity to fly 776 miles to play the same team again in the first round of the NCAA Division II national volleyball tournament.
 
But make no mistake, the Roadrunners are excited about their chances in the eight-team South Central Regional, and they are perfectly fine with getting another shot at the Orediggers.
 
"There are pros and cons to playing them again," MSU Denver coach Jenny Glenn said. "It's a team that we definitely know. We just played them, so from a scouting perspective they're very familiar to us … so there's an advantage to that for both teams.
 
"We always like to play different teams because we tend to play the same teams over and over in the conference. We do get excited to have a chance to play a Lone Star or a Heartland Conference team, but we'll just have to get deeper in the tournament to get that opportunity."
 
The fifth-seeded Roadrunners (21-9) play No. 4 seed Mines (23-5) in a 6:30 p.m. MST match Thursday in Stephenville, Texas, home of top-seed and national No. 13 Tarleton State.
 
MSU Denver and Mines split two previous meetings, with the Orediggers overcoming a first-set loss to win in four when the teams played at the Auraria Event Center on Oct. 19 before their Friday night classic in the RMAC semifinals. MSU Denver feel behind 0-2 in that one, then fought off four match points in a third set it eventually won 33-31, then rolled through the final two sets of the five-set win.
 
"It was really fun playing them last time," senior outside hitter Santaisha Sturges (Parker, Colo./Regis Jesuit) said. "They're a very good team, so to have another opportunity to play them in the NCAA tournament is great."
 
Sturges and fellow senior outside hitterTaylor Duryea (Logan, Utah/Sky View), both first-team All-RMAC selections, were named to the RMAC all-tournament team.
 
They led a Roadrunners team that went into the RMAC tournament on the outside looking in for a potential 19^thstraight trip to the NCAA tournament. A quarterfinal win over Regis improved MSU Denver's chances, but nothing was certain as the match with Mines played out. That win put them into the field, and in fact help the Roadrunners shoot all the way up to a No. 5 seed, despite a three-set loss to Colorado Mesa in the RMAC final.
 
An emotionally-charged week culminated with the Sunday night announcement that the Roadrunners had made the tournament, viewed by team members at a tense watch party that turned into a celebration.
 
"My stomach was hurting when we were sitting there watching it," Sturges said of Sunday's watch party. "I was telling Taylor, 'I'm so nervous, I'm so nervous. I think we've got it, but I'm so nervous.' Seeing (MSU Denver) pop up there (on the bracket on the TV screen), there was so much relief and so much excitement to know that we're not done and we get to keep writing our story. It's a great feeling."
 
Said Duryea: "It felt like the longest day of my life. We just didn't know, after Saturday, what would happen. There was definitely a little bit of relief to see that we were in, and excitement to see that we are the fifth seed, and confidence because we all know that we deserve to be there and we worked really hard to put ourselves in that situation."
 
Now, after playing arguably its best volleyball of the season in the most pressure-packed situations they had faced, MSU Denver will be tasked with repeating the feat this week.
 
A win Thursday means a second-round matchup with either Tarleton State or Heartland Conference tournament champion Arkansas-Fort Smith, which will be challenged to upset the regional host on its home floor.
 
Win twice and the Roadrunners will be playing Saturday for a chance to reach the Division II Elite Eight for the first time in the program's history.
 
"This was a good week for us to show what we're capable of," senior middle blocker Stephanie Laraway (Lakewood, Colo./Lakewood) said. "We've been talking about it a lot, what we see of our team and what we bring as individuals. This week showed us that, yes, that piece is there."
 
Said Sturges: "We're very determined. That's the word we're using, because we know we can go far in this tournament."
 
Indeed, the Roadrunners have beaten the regional's No. 2 seed, national No. 20 Texas A&M-Commerce. They've beaten No. 4 seed Mines. And they've beaten the No. 6 seed, Dixie State. Only No. 3 seed Mesa, which has won twice against the Roadrunners, has escaped unscathed among the regional teams that MSU Denver has played (in all MSU Denver is 3-3 against the field).
 
Now that they've fought their way in, the Roadrunners have considerable tournament experience on their side. Laraway and Sturges are playing in their fourth NCAA tournaments, while middle blocker Alyssa Kelling (Merton, Wis./Arrowhead) is in her third.
 
"I love the experience of our group," Glenn said. "Of the four RMAC schools, we are the most veteran when it comes to NCAA tournament experience. This group has gone to the Sweet 16, to the Round of 32, so we have experience not only playing in the tournament, but in going deeper than the first round. We need to use that to our advantage."
 
Said Laraway: "It's more intense. And it's single (elimination), so there's some pressure there. But this group, our upperclassmen, we've been to the NCAA and we know what it's like. And just preparing the younger girls for it, we have a group that has really bought in."
 
Is there another high-quality weekend left? Glenn thinks so.
 
"We've faced so many different situations this year," Glenn said. "This team is battle-tested. We've played the top teams in the country (including top-ranked Cal State San Bernardino and defending national champion Concordia-St. Paul) and we have so much experience under our belt. We've gone through highs and lows and that's prepared us for big moments, which we had last week. It was fun to finally push through in those moments as a result of all the hard work throughout the season.
 
"This group has a little bit of a different edge than the regular-season Roadrunners team. We've proven to ourselves that we can be mentally tough, and we can be gritty in moments where our backs are against the wall. We have three seniors on this team who are playing for their careers, and there's a lot of passion behind that. We hope that we can put everything together. I don't think we've had a match yet this year where every piece of our game has been firing on all cylinders. We just hope we can get a few of those matches in this next week."