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St. Paul, Minn. - It's hard to beat a team twice in one season, let alone within a nine day stretch -- but the No. 2 University of Minnesota Duluth made a clean sweep of the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference/U.S. Bank Tournament Championship game, defeating third-ranked Concordia University-St. Paul in three sets in St. Paul on Sunday afternoon.
UMD (31-2) has not defeated Concordia twice in a season since 2007, and they haven't swept the Golden Bears since 2002 -- but the 2013 Bulldogs knocked off CU 25-22, 25-21, and 29-27 on its home court to bring each of those "last times..." into the new decade.
UMD's
Kate Lange, Ashley Hinsch, Julie Rainey and Sydnie Mauch were named to the NSIC/US Bank All-Tournament Team along with Concordia's
Amanda Konetchy and
Kayla Koenecke.
"That's an amazing volleyball team, obviously, but we played aggresively and fortunately, we were able to come out on top," said head coach
Jim Boos after the match. Four Bulldogs and two Golden Bears made up the 2013 NSIC/U.S. Bank All-Tournament Team, with UMD's senior outside hitter
Kate Lange and freshman middle blocker
Sydnie Mauch standing out on this day. Lange had 19 kills and nine digs, hitting .385 on the afternoon, while Mauch hit .565 with 15 kills. Sophomore setter
Ashley Hinsch also earned an all-tournament nod with 50 assists in the three-set match, also pairing up on a trio of blocks and adding three kills.
On the defensive end, junior libero
Julie Rainey had 20 digs to earn herself UMD's fourth All-Tournament selection. Sophomore middle blocker
Monica Turner had five blocks, including one solo. CU senior setter Amanda Konetchy and senior right-side hitter Kayla Koenecke rounded out the all-tournament selections. Koenecke had 14 kills against the Bulldogs and Konetchy had 39 assists and 10 digs. UMD hit .346 on a team, while the Golden Bears hit .298. The match had 70 tied scores and lead changes.
With a spot in the NCAA Tournament secured along with the conference title, the Bulldogs await tomorrow night's selection show (airing on ncaa.com at 6:30 p.m. CT) to find out only where they will be going. The Central Regional tournament will take place Dec. 5-7 at the home court of the top seed.