MANKATO, Minn. - The Buena Vista volleyball team was two points away from picking up another five-set victory, but it was Bethany Lutheran which rallied for the final three points of the decisive fifth set to walk way with the a 3-2 victory on Wednesday night.

The Vikings got the early momentum by hanging on for a 26-24 victory in the opening set.  The teams traded sets all night with BVU winning sets two and four by scores of 25-20 and 25-21 while Bethany Lutheran was victorious in the third, 25-20, before it hung on for a 15-13 win in the fifth.

BLC had an 8-4 advantage in the final stanza before the Beavers rolled off three straight points to get within 8-7, and after the Vikings extended the margin to 12-10, BVU again rolled off three straight to take a 13-12 lead.  The Vikings (9-14) finished with a pair of kills and used a hitting error by the Beavers to rally back and avenge an early five-set loss to the Beavers in Storm Lake.

It was another strong night at the net for sophomore Sydney McLaren, who registered a match-high 19 kills and had just four errors for a .242 percentage.  Over her last six matches, she has registered 76 kills and only 10 errors, and has a hitting percentage of .332 during that span.  She also chipped in with a season-high 28 digs.  Freshmen Kaitie Serkiz and Hannah Smith followed with 14 and 13 kills, respectively.  Smith needs seven more kills on the year to join the other two with 200 overall.

BVU finished the match with 62 kills, which was three more than the Vikings.  Freshman Taylor Wedemeyer dished out 48 assists and also had 20 digs.  Summer Goss had a team-leading 33 digs and now sits at 1,411 in her career which is within 37 of moving into a tie for third-place on the program's all-time list.  She now has 456 on the year which is within 15 of her career-high and seventh on the single-season charts.  

"Certainly a tough loss for us tonight," said BVU head coach Aubrey Havlichek.  "Unfortunately, the team that wanted it more walked away with the win.  Statistically you wouldn't have thought we lost, but we made errors at some very bad times and had too many communication errors.  Credit to Bethany Lutheran, they fought hard that whole match."

Buena Vista is now 9-12 overall and will head back up north this weekend to play at Carleton College on Friday night at 7 p.m. before playing at Macalester on Saturday afternoon at 3 p.m.