DENVER – The path forward for the MSU Denver volleyball team, ranked No. 1 in NCAA Division II, is clear.
 
That doesn't mean it will be easy.
 
Starting Thursday, MSU Denver hopes to play and win three matches in three days on its home floor to reach the national tournament quarterfinals for the first time in the program's Division II history. Do that, and there's a chance to win three more matches in three days in Seattle from Dec. 1 through 3 for a national title.
 
"At the conference tournament, you know that you do get a second chance if you lose," MSU Denver right-side hitter Kelsey Gordon said. "But this is the final stage. You get one shot. You give it all you've got for six matches, and whoever has the best team at the end of six matches is going to come out with a national championship."
 
Up first is Thursday's 5 p.m. match at the Auraria Event Center with CSU Pueblo in the first round of the South Central Regional. It's the third time the programs have met this season after squaring off four times in 2021. For the second straight season the Roadrunners and ThunderWolves are meeting in the first round as the Nos. 1 and 8 seeds, respectively.
 
MSU Denver has won 32 straight in the series dating to 1999 and is 63-9 all-time against CSU Pueblo. But CSU Pueblo has also given the Roadrunners fits twice over the past two years, forcing a fifth set when the teams played in Pueblo both last year and this year. CSU Pueblo held two match points against MSU Denver in 2021, coming oh-so-close to snapping what is now a 40-match winning streak for the Roadrunners in regular-season conference play.
 
"It's a program that continues to get better every time they step on the floor," MSU Denver coach Jenny Glenn said. "They're a forced to be reckoned with. They took their first-round match with Colorado School of Mines to the wire at the conference tournament. We expect them to play very feisty defense, and we expect them to serve the ball tough. And even though we've seen them a couple of times, everybody brings something a little different at tournament time and we'll try to be ahead of that."
 
CSU Pueblo has forced the Roadrunners into long rallies time and again. In the meeting on Nov. 5, MSU Denver had an astounding 113 digs, the program's highest total since setting its rally-scoring era record of 114 in a match in 2004. The Roadrunners topped 100 digs in only two matches last season – both against CSU Pueblo.
 
"I'm excited to play them again because they're always going to put up a fight, and that's what you want in the NCAAs," middle blocker Ember Canty said. "We're excited to see what they're going to bring to the table."
 
Said Gordon: "The first time you play a team, it's going to be a tactical match, a skill match. The second time is study the film, see the errors we made and how can we improve? The third time you're going to have everything. You've changed your game plan from A to B, and now you've got to find a C. We've got to find a new way to come out on top, but at the end of the day it's just going to be Roadrunner Volleyball."
 
Roadrunner Volleyball, 28-1 this season and winners of 22 in a row, is continuing an upwards trajectory. Though this is the 22^nd straight NCAA Tournament for the program, new heights have been reached in terms of its national prominence. The Roadrunners have been ranked in the top four nationally in every AVCA poll this season, in 23 straight dating to the third week of 2021 and in 34 of the last 36 dating to early in the 2020 season (played in the spring of 2021 due to COVID-19).
 
"Last year definitely set a foundation for this year," Canty said. "We got a little glimpse of what we could be in the regional tournament. We're definitely using our experiences and building on that, and we're ready to have a different ending."
 
Last season came to an end in this same South Central Regional on this same court. The Roadrunners were five points away from sweeping West Texas A&M in the regional final, before the Lady Buffs rallied, won in five sets and denied MSU Denver its first trip to the Division II national quarterfinals.
 
"That match has come up a couple of times in the past year," Glenn said. "But it's kind of an unspoken thing. We don't have to talk about the fact that that was not fun, to be in that scenario and have the tide turn against us. At the beginning of the year we talked about, 'Play the game, do the best you can, see what happens.' That's all you really can do – prepare, play hard and see where it takes you. If we hang all of our hopes on winning matches or getting a national championship, we're not going to play very free. We're a very mission-oriented group, very driven."
 
West Texas A&M, ranked ninth nationally, is back in the South Central Regional as the No. 2 seed and would be a potential opponent in the regional final if both teams win twice. Also in the field is No. 14 Regis, No. 18 Colorado Mesa, and No. 22 Colorado School of Mines – those teams are seeded third, fifth and sixth, respectively. Dallas Baptist is the fourth seed and Texas-Tyler is seventh.
 
Action starts Thursday at noon (West Texas A&M vs. Texas-Tyler), with other matches scheduled for 2:30 p.m. (Regis vs. Colorado School of Mines), 5 p.m. (MSU Denver-CSU Pueblo) and 7:30 (Dallas Baptist vs. Colorado Mesa).
 
The semifinals are Friday at 5 p.m. and 7:30 (MSU Denver would play at 7:30), and the final is Saturday at 6 p.m.
 
After reaching six straight RMAC Tournament finals without winning, MSU Denver finally pushed through that barrier last weekend by beating Regis for the title.
 
Now, a supremely confident team will be looking to break through another barrier this weekend and reach the national quarterfinals.
 
"In previous years, we wanted to use that loss in the (RMAC tournament) championship to kind of fuel us, or to look at it as getting that loss off our back after having been on a long winning streak," Glenn said. "But I also think that it does create a little bit of doubt, even though we have always had a lot of confidence. Coming off a championship, it shows this is a team that it can get it done when it matters, so I think there is a boost of confidence."