GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— Colorado Mesa University freshman Henley Madsen and Ashlyn Tafoya both recorded season-highs and double-doubles as the Maverick volleyball team opened up a key 3-match, 5-day homestand with a 4-set (25-20, 25-22, 22-25, 25-21) Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference win over visiting Colorado Christian University on Friday night here in Brownson Arena.
 
Madsen recorded 17 kills and 15 digs, her highest totals of her young collegiate career to tally her first double-double in a CMU uniform while Tafoya tallied a season-high 47 digs while adding ten digs to record her sixth of the campaign and her second straight.
 
The Mavericks, who improved to 11-5 overall and 5-2 in the RMAC, also had balanced hitting from four other players as the finished the night hitting .272.
 
The Cougars slipped to 9-8 overall and to 4-3 in the RMAC with their fifth straight loss but received a solid 16-kill effort from Renee Phillips in the middle.  Phillips also hit .483 while Connelly Kilgore added 13 digs and eight digs in the losing effort.
 
The Cougars finished with a .186 attack percentage.
 
Maverick middle blocker Macy Wood also had a solid outing, hitting .500 with 11 kills while Emma Luce had ten kills from the outside.  Aesha Alrashed also added nine kills and four blocks from the middle while Sadie Scoville had eight kills and 15 digs as another outside hitter.
 
Maverick libero Allison Waller had 18 digs to match her CCU counterpart Kristina House.
 
The Mavericks hit at a blistering .467 clip in the opening set as Alrashed and Madsen put down four kills each.  The Mavs trailed 15-12 in the set but finished on a 13-5 run to claim the early lead.
 
The Mavs also built a 13-7 lead in the second set and still led 15-9 before the Cougars went on a 7-0 run to take a 16-18 advantage.
 
The Mavericks then capitalized on a Cougar service error to stop the run and went on to score the final five points of the set after trailing 22-20 to take a 2-0 overall lead.
 
The third set proved to be the tightest of the match and featured six ties and a pair of lead changes as CCU went on a 3-0 run to reverse a 19-18 deficit in to a 21-19 lead after a successful video replay challenge.
 
They then went on to close out the set on kills by Kilgore and Emily Darwin to keep the match alive.
 
However, the Mavericks bounced back quickly and jumped out to a 15-7 lead in the fourth set on back-to-back Scoville kills.  They then later extended the lead to 21-10 before a 6-0 Cougar spurt cut the gap by more than half.
 
The Mavs then went on to build a 24-18 lead and appeared to have won sealed the match.  However, another successful Cougar replay challenge triggered a 3-0 spurt that was ultimately thwarted when the Cougars' Suzanna Conner sent the ensuing serve long as the Mavericks were able to prevail.
 
The Mavericks will continue an important stretch on Saturday afternoon at 3 o'clock, taking on RMAC-leading CSU Pueblo, which pulled out a 5-set road win at Westminster in Salt Lake City on Friday night.
 
The ThunderWolves remained perfect in RMAC matches at 7-0 and won for the ninth straight time to improve to 13-4 overall.
 
Saturday's match will have extra importance for CMU Head Coach Austin Albers, who had spent the past six seasons in charge of the ThunderWolves.  Four Maverick players, including Scoville and Wood, also played with the Pack last year.