BHSU Begins RMAC Schedule With Matchups Versus Skyhawks and Mountaineers

SPEARFISH, S.D.- The Black Hills State Yellow Jackets (4-4) are going into the opening weekend of RMAC games. After a successful weekend at the Sioux Falls Volleyball Classic, the Green and Gold will look to start conference play strong as they will welcome the Fort Lewis Skyhawks (5-3) and the Western Colorado Mountaineers (4-4) to A2 Arena. BHSU will be looking for a couple of wins, and head coach Grayson DuBose will be looking for a massive milestone.

KNOW BEFORE YOU GO:
Date/Time/Location: Fort Lewis: Friday, September 11 at 6 PM at A2 Arena in Spearfish, S.D.

Western Colorado: Saturday, September 12 at 5:30 PM at A2 Arena in Spearfish, S.D.

Live Stream: RMAC Network (Pay-Per-View)
Tickets: Tickets can be purchased at the link above. It is highly advised that you purchase tickets in advance online. It will be CASH ONLY at the arena.

BLACK HILLS STATE STORYLINES:

• Black Hills State is now 4-4 and was able to maintain their .500 record after falling in the first two games of the Sioux Falls Volleyball Classic to #6 Washburn and Sioux Falls. They were able to remain 4-4 because they pulled off a dominant win over UMary and then hung on in a five-set thriller versus Upper Iowa. This puts BHSU at .500 heading into conference play for only the third time since joining DII.
• The Yellow Jackets entered the season fresh off a season where they had the most wins in a season since 2021 and the most conference wins since 2022. The Yellow Jackets went 6-20 (2-12 RMAC) last season. They went 3-1 in the 1st International Bank Homecoming Classic before entering RMAC play and pulled out two wins over Chadron, one of them in the regional pod, and a win over Western Colorado in regular conference play.
• BHSU has gone 3-1 in one of their regular season tournaments in each of the last three seasons, they were unable to keep that streak alive this year, but still won two games in each tournament, which is the first time in the D2 era that they’ve done that.
• The Green and Gold played in three five set matches going 2-1 this season in such matches. BHSU went 2-2 in five setters last year and are 41-41 since joining D2 in matches that go five sets.
• The Yellow Jackets are ranked top 100 in two categories after the first weekend. They are 68th in hitting percentage (.232) and 95th in team kills (345).
• The Yellow Jackets are featuring a pretty new team this year. They are only bringing back three players who started 15 or more games last year and only have five that started more than ten. They graduated five key seniors for the team last year and are bringing in six freshman and one transfer.
• BHSU was projected to finish 14th in the RMAC Preseason Coaches’ Poll with 43 points, just ahead of Chadron State and one point behind Western Colorado.
• Izzy Saiki was the top player for BHSU in the first weekend of games. The senior from Thronton, Colo. is in the midst of a career year. She has a team-high 86 kills with a 2.87 kills per set mark and a .236 hitting percentage. She is also leading the team in aces with 13 and is fifth in the RMAC in total aces. She also has 53 digs and four total blocks. She had a career-high 20 kills versus Western New Mexico and had 37 kills this past weekend with six aces and 23 digs. She had her second double-double of the season with 12 kills and 11 digs versus Upper Iowa.
• Zoie Husman was a new face in the starting lineup in Bismarck. After serving last year as a serve specialist, Husman has started all eight games this year and after a fantastic tournament in Sioux Falls, she is second on the tema with 80 kills, ten aces and 62 digs. She also has nine blocks. Her best game of the year came versus Western New Mexico, where she had her first double-double of her career with 17 kills and 13 digs. The 17 kills were a career-high by over ten kills. She also had a career-high 19.5 points versus WNMU as well as three total blocks, which was her third career-high in that one game. She matched her career-high in kills again with 17 kills versus UMary and a .667 hitting percentage, which was also a career-high. She had her second double of her season with a 13 kill, 15 dig game versus Upper Iowa.
• Carsyn Mettler, the senior from Rapid City, was another top hitter for BHSU this past week. Mettler, who has remained consistent now has a hitting percentage over .300 in five out of eight games this year. She is third on the team in kills with 77, a team-high .289 hitting percentage, and is third on the team with 11 total blocks. She has reached ten kills in three games this year. She had a .320 hitting percentage against #6 Washburn, and then a .455 hitting percentage versus UMary. She had 13 kills and two blocks versus Upper Iowa this past weekend.
• Elena Atkinson and Emma Kruger have had almost identical seasons. After combining for 145 assists last weekend, they combined for 135 this weekend with Kruger getting 70 assists to Atkinson’s 65. Atkinson sits atop with 144 assists and has averaged 4.80 assists per set this season, while Kruger has 138 and has averaged 4.53. The former had a .365 set percentage to the latter’s .378. Atkinson’s best game came against Western New Mexico, where she had 33 assists, which the second most in her entire career. She had a .407 set percentage, which was the second-best on the weekend, only behind MSUB, where she had a .514 set percentage. Kruger’s best game came against UMary, when BHSU broke the record for attack percentage in a game in the D2 era. She had 25 assists with an impressive .568 set percentage. They are ranked ninth and tenth in the RMAC in total assists.
• Keira Thompson has been the top libero for BHSU this year. The junior from Lakewood, Colo. who is in her second season as a Yellow Jacket has started all eight games at the libero position. She is currently leading the team with 107 digs, reaching the 100-dig mark against Upper Iowa. She is averaging 3.57 digs per set and has six aces as well. Thompson had her career-high of 21 digs this past weekend versus Upper Iowa. She also had a career-high three aces versus Upper Iowa and a career-high three points in that game as well.
• Izabel Abril has been one of the other players to start all eight games this year. Abril is sitting at 45 kills and is tied for the team lead with 15.0 total blocks. She has yet to reach ten kills yet, but just had her best game of the season last week versus Upper Iowa, where she had nine kills and four blocks with a .389 hitting percentage.
• Peyton McLeod has continued her solid career with eight starts in eight games this year. She is tied for the team lead in blocks with 15 and has 39 kills. McLeod had a career-high nine kills versus UMary in the first tournament, and then matched it again this past weekend versus Upper Iowa. She had a .364 hitting percentage versus UMary this past weekend and a .294 versus UIU.
• Head coach Grayson DuBose enters his second season with the Yellow Jackets and has a BHSU record of 10-24 (2-12 RMAC) but has 14 years of head coaching experience at the D1 level prior to joining BHSU. He was head coach at Utah State for all 14 years and has a 199-257 career record with two WAC Coach of the Year awards and one NCAA Division 1 Tournament appearance. DuBose is only one game away from the 200-career win mark.

FORT LEWIS STORYLINES

• Fort Lewis is entering this matchup at 5-3 and are coming off four straight wins at the CSU Pueblo Tournament. The Skyhawks were able to get big wins over CSU Pueblo and #RV Minnesota Duluth while also grabbing wins against Adelphi and Florida Tech. They only lost three sets the entire weekend. FLC went 1-3 in the opening tournament with losses that included MSU Moorhead and #21 Angelo State with their sole win being East Central University.
• FLC is 1-1 in road games this year with the win over Pueblo and the loss to Angelo State. The Skyhawks were better on the road then at home last year going 6-5 on the road last season compared to 3-6 at home.
• The Skyhawks are ranked top 100 in four categories currently. They are 53rd in team attacks per set (36.50), 87th in team total attacks (1,022), 92nd in team aces (52), and 96th in win-loss percentage (.625).
• The Skyhawks were placed in seventh in the RMAC Preseason Coaches’ Poll.  They received a total of 112 points and were placed just behind Colorado Christian and just ahead of South Dakota Mines.
• Alyx Dougherty is one of the top players for Fort Lewis. She is also one of the top liberos in the RMAC. She earned a spot on the Preseason All-RMAC Team after earning Second Team All-Conference last year. Dougherty is currently 36th in the country in digs per set (4.75), which leads the RMAC. She is also 45th in total digs (133), and 54th in aces (15), both of which put her second in the RMAC. Dougherty has reached double-digit digs in six of the eight games. She is coming off a Defensive Player of the Week performance at the CSUP Tournament, where she had 72 digs over four games including two games where she had over 25 digs in just four sets. She had a season-high 29 digs against Minnesota Duluth and then had 26 digs versus CSU Pueblo.
• Alina Nunez is the other top player for the Skyhawks. The senior out of Tucson, Arizona was also named Preseason All-RMAC. She has started this year off great leading her team in kills with 80. She is averaging 2.86 kills per set and has a .276 hitting percentage. Nunez also has added five aces, 54 digs, which is second on the team, and eight total blocks. Nunez has reached ten or more kills in four of eight games this year. She is coming off being named RMAC Offensive Player of the Week this past weekend in Pueblo. She had 52 total kills in four games, and had a hitting percentage better than .350 in three of the four games. Against CSUP, she had 18 kills with a .459 hitting percentage. She also had a double-double with 11 kills and 11 digs versus Adelphi.
• The Skyhawks have a setter tandem with Arianna Reyna and Addie Garn handling the duties. The pair have combined for 255 assists and 13 aces this year with Reyna holding the slight lead with 129 assists to Garn’s 126. Reyna is averaging 4.61 assists per set, while Garn is averaging 4.50. Reyna just had her best game of the season with 22 assists and 10 digs versus the ThunderWovles. Garn also had her best game of the season versus CSUP with 24 assists and nine digs.
• Jordan DeJesus is the other top hitter for FLC. The senior from Flower Mound, Texas has 73 kills this year with eight aces, 47 digs, and five blocks. DeJesus has reached double-digit kills in five of her eight games and just had her first double-double this year with 12 kills and 10 digs versus Pueblo.
• Head coach Justin Wong enters his second season for the Skyhawks. Wong has a career record of 19-15 (8-6 RMAC) and gave the Skyhawks their first winning season since 2010 last year in his first year.

SERIES HISTORY

• BHSU has a 4-10 record versus FLC sine joining the RMAC. BHSU won four out of six from 2015-2020 but have lost five straight matches to the Skyhawks since 2021 and have only own four sets in those games.
• Last year in Durango, Fort Lewis won 3-0 with BHSU getting to at least 19 in all three sets. Abril had six kills and Atkinson had 12 assists.

WESTERN COLORADO STORYLINES

• Western Colorado will be entering the weekend at 4-4 with a matchup versus SDM before they play BHSU. The Moutaineers started their season great with a 4-0 performance at their home tournament in Gunnison getting wins versus SW Oklahoma State, Highlands, Sul Ross State, and Lubbock Christian. They swept each of the last three games of that tourney. They then went down to Hawaii, where they went 0-4 at the Hawai’i Challenge. They only took one set from Hawaii Pacific, but fell in straight sets to Western Oregon, Chaminade, and Hawaii Hilo.
• Western is 0-2 on the road so far this year and they were 0-11 on the road last year. Their last road win was on October 19, 2024 versus New Mexico Highlands in Las Vegas.
• The Mountaineers are ranked top 90 in five different categories. They are ranked 58th in team attacks per set (36.44), 63rd in assists per set (11.93), 68th in kills per set (12.93), 82nd in blocks per set (1.93), and 89th in total blocks (52.0).
• After finishing last in the RMAC this past year, Western Colorado was picked to finish 13th in the RMAC with 44 points, one point ahead of Black Hills State, and eight points behind New Mexico Highlands.
• Kyra Kidd, a senior middle blocker from Woodland Park, Colorado, has a had an outstanding start to the year. She currently sits at 36 kills, eight aces, and 25 total blocks. She ranks ninth in the RMAC in blocks per set (0.96). Kidd’s top game came this past week versus Hawaii Pacific as she had seven blocks and six kills. She finished with 11 total blocks last weekend.
• Galatia Andrew is up there in the top of the RMAC for liberos. She currently sits at 128 digs and 4.74 digs per set. She ranks second in digs per set and fifth in total digs in the RMAC. She has reached double-digit digs in seven of the eight games this year including a season high 23 versus Sul Ross State. She also had 22 versus SW Oklahoma State and 21 versus Hawaii Hilo. She had 52 digs last weekend and reached double-digits in three of the four games.
• The Mountaineers run a two-setter system and have a solid setter pair in Anuhea Kaalele and Olivia Moore. The two have combined for 276 assists with Kaalele having 147, which is eighth in the RMAC. She averages 5.65 assists per set which is sixth in the conference, while Moore averaged 5.38 assists per set, which is ninth in the conference. Kaalele had a massive opening game versus SWOSU with 40 assists and has reached double-digit assists in every game so far. She had 61 assists last weekend with 19 versus Chaminade and Hawaii Pacific. Moore has also reached double-digit assists in every game and her season-high was versus NMHU, where she had 25 assists.
• Sierra Long has currently been the top hitter for WCU. Long sits at 64 kills and 11.0 total blocks, which puts her total points at a team-high 71.0. She is averaging 2.78 kills per set and has a .260 hitting percentage. She had a solid first tournament with double-digit kills in three of the four games with 16 versus Sul Ross State, but she only had 19 total kills in four games last weekend with her top game being eight kills versus Hilo.
• Sonia Morales-Jones is in her second season as head coach of the Western Colorado. She was head coach at Benedictine University Mesa for nine season prior. Overall, she has a 171-117 record. At WCU, she has a 5-29 (0-14 RMAC) record.

SERIES HISTORY

• Since joining the RMAC, the two teams are tied in their matchups with an 8-8 record. WCU has won six of the last eight games, but Black Hills State currently holds the belt.
• Their most recent meeting came last year in Gunnison. The Yellow Jackers were able to get one of their two RMAC wins last year versus Western in four sets taking three in a row after losing the first. Mettler had a team-high 15 kill day, while Atkinson had 25 assists and 11 digs. McLeod and Abril had four blocks each.