TAMPA, Florida— The Colorado Mesa University volleyball team gave the top-ranked and defending NCAA Division II University of Tampa Spartans all they could handle before the Spartans rallied for a 5-set win over the 24^th-ranked Mavericks in a back-and-forth affair on Saturday afternoon here in the Bob Martinez Athletics Center.
 
The Mavericks won the first set, 25-18, and had a 17-10 in the second before the Spartans rallied to pull it out 25-22.
 
The Mavs then won the third set, 25-20, before falling behind 5-0 and 8-3 in the fourth.
 
However, the Mavs came back to take a 17-16 lead only to eventually drop the fourth set, 25-22.
 
CMU also took a 6-4 lead in the decisive fifth set before the Spartans went on a 7-2 spurt to take an 11-7 lead en-route to the 15-9 victory after a nearly 2 ½-hour battle.
 
Although they dropped the match, the Mavericks finished with a 64-49 advantage in total kills and out-hit the Spartans, who have now won 27 straight matches dating back to October 8, 2021, .149 to .115.
 
They are now 6-0 this season.
 
Sierra Hunt led the Mavs with 17 kills.  Erin Curl (14 kills, 12 digs) and setter Sabrina VanDeList (51 assists, 20 digs) both recorded double-doubles while Sydney Leffler and Savannah Spitzer both finished with 12 kills.  Spitzer also hit .440 to pace CMU.
 
Meanwhile, libero Kerstin Layman recorded a season-high 27 digs as the Mavs finished with a 98-85 edge in that category.
 
However, the Mavericks were guilty of 11 service errors throughout the match, five more than the Spartans.  Tampa also had a 13-7 advantage in blocks.
 
Curl had four blocks to pace CMU.
 
VanDeList matched a career-high for digs while registering her second straight double-double.  Curl's was her first.
 
The Mavs are only the second team to have taken the Spartans to five sets during the reigning national champions' winning streak.
 
The five sets in Saturday's match were tied an incredible combined 25 times.  The fourth set featured nine ties and six lead changes alone.
 
Curl had five kills in the opening set, which saw the Mavericks record four of their blocks.  Tampa was also guilty of 12 attacking errors in the opening frame.
 
The Mavs then built a 17-10 on a Hunt kill before a service error after a Spartan cooled CMU's momentum.
 
Spitzer then put the Mavs up 18-11 before the Spartans recorded four blocks while taking advantage of four other Maverick hitting errors to go on a 8-0 run to surge into a 19-18 lead.
 
Spitzer then stopped the bleeding to even the set at 19 before another 4-0 Spartan run helped the top-ranked hosts even the match.
 
The Mavericks did not stop their fight and raced out to a 9-4 third-set lead before later using a 10-3 run to build their lead up to eight points at 21-13 while going on to take the 25-20 decision and a 2-1 overall lead.

After falling behind 5-0 in the fourth, the Mavericks rallied to take a 12-11 lead on a Tye Wedhorn kill and Spartan hitting error.
 
The Mavs would go on to cling to their advantage at 19-18 on a Spitzer kill before another service error triggered a 3-0 Tampa run that that allowed the champions to go ahead 21-19.
 
CMU could not fully recover and dropped the fourth frame, sending the match to the fifth.
 
In that decisive set, the Spartans got out to a 3-1 lead before a 3-0 and 5-1 spurt, which featured three Leffler kills and an ace from the sophomore outside hitter, gave CMU a 6-4 lead.
 
However, the Spartans once again rallied to score the next three points to take a 7-6 advantage.
 
Spitzer then put down a kill to level the set at 7 before another 4-0 Spartan run proved to be the difference.
 
The Mavs, now 4-2 on the season, will wrap up the weekend playing Tusculum (0-3) in their final match of the Tampa Volleyball Classic at 3:30 p.m. MDT on Saturday.