DENVER – No. 2 MSU Denver bounced back after dropping the first set and rolled to a 3-1 win Saturday at No. 18 Regis, extending the Roadrunners' regular-season conference winning streak to 36 matches.
 
In earning the 23-25, 25-19, 25-14, 25-16 win, MSU Denver compiled an excellent .323 hitting percentage, including .381 over the final three sets at the Regis Field House.
 
"We started the match a little tight," said MSU Denver coach Jenny Glenn, whose team surrendered five of Regis' first 10 points on service errors and also had three net errors. "But we had asked them to be aggressive – and weren't passive for sure. We knew that if we stayed aggressive, eventually everything would fall into place as the match wore on.
 
"We were super nervous and excited to play this match. And Regis is a team that makes you uncomfortable. It took us a while to get comfortable, and I wouldn't say we started finding our flow until the third set."
 
With their 15^th straight win, the Roadrunners extended their record to 21-1 overall and improved to 14-0 in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference.
 
"We had so many fans in the gym," Glenn said. "It was a very stimulating and rowdy environment and we had a lot of people there for us. Roadrunner fans showed up and we were super appreciative of all of them."
 
MSU Denver now has a two-match lead – as well as the tiebreaker advantage – over Regis (16-6, 12-2), Colorado School of Mines (17-5, 12-2) and Colorado Mesa (16-4, 11-2), which means the Roadrunners need to win only one of their next four matches to earn the top seed for the league tournament, and need only two wins for the outright championship.
 
"This was such a critical match in terms of the conference standings and possibly hosting the regional again," Glenn said. "And we love these matches because they force you to be better. Win or lose, we got better today, especially because of how we responded after a slow start. We stayed aggressive, and we can trust that going forward."
 
Meanwhile, should the Roadrunners win out to close the regular season, they would break the RMAC's record of 39 straight regular-season league wins.
 
And, finally, for added intrigue, top-ranked Wayne State (Neb.) lost in five sets Saturday at No. 5 Southwest Minnesota State, opening up the possibility that MSU Denver could move up to No. 1 – where it spent five weeks last season. Of course there's still a strong case for Wayne State to remain No. 1 (it has two wins over No. 3 Concordia-St. Paul, which handed MSU Denver its only loss). Or, Concordia St.-Paul has won 13 straight and has lost only to Wayne State. Southwest Minnesota State might've made the jump, but lost Thursday at Augustana (S.D.) prior to knocking off Wayne State. No. 4 Minnesota-Duluth has lost only to Wayne State and Concordia-St. Paul.
 
The next AVCA poll comes out Monday afternoon.
 
But, back to Saturday's match, All-American Rylee Hladky finished strong after a slow start and had 14 kills on .344 hitting, and she added eight digs to move within three of becoming the eighth player in program history with both 1,000 kills and 1,000 digs.
 
Right-side hitters Kaylee Corsentino (11 kills, .360 hitting) and Kelsey Gordon (eight kills, .375) combined for 19 kills and .366 hitting. Middle blockers Ember Canty (seven kills, three blocks) and Mikayla McClinton (six kills, six blocks) combined for 13 kills on .357 hitting to go with nine blocks. And Riley Anderson, like Hladky a left-side hitter, had 10 kills.
 
"For our left sides, the shots they normally hit weren't available," Glenn said. "But they did a great job of finding new shots and different areas to hit."
 
Meanwhile, Amela Qershia set 27 assists and Delaney Eckhardt added 21. Ashlyn Cianciulli had a team-best 21 digs.
 
After hitting .203 through two sets, Regis hit .097 the rest of the way to finish at .147 – the 15^th straight time MSU Denver has held its opponent under .200 hitting. MSU Denver has won 15 straight matches.
 
"Our setters did a nice job distributing the ball," Glenn said. "And we were able to do some things tactically because we had execution from a defensive standpoint from our blockers – their ability to have a good mindset and stay in the moment allowed us to get some critical stops. And then our serving fell into place as the match wore on. Serving and blocking usually open things up for us and allow us to go on some runs."