DE PERE – St. Norbert College got off to a great start with a pair of wins on the first day of its Second Annual Chick-fil-A Invitational at Mulva Sports Center.
 
The Green Knights (4-3) gained a 3-1 Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference over Dominican University by scores of 25-20, 25-16, 28-30, 25-16. St. Norbert then swept UW-Stout 3-0 by scores of 25-21, 34-32, 25-15.
 
The first set against Dominican featured 10 ties and six lead changes, with the Green Knights taking the lead for good with a 5-0 run after trailing 14-13. Alyssa Mills had a pair of kills and Lauren Borchardt added another during the run, which also had a Maddie Kitowski service ace. Dominican would climb back to within 23-20, but a Stars attacking error and an Andrianna Volz service ace sealed the set.
 
St. Norbert went on a 6-0 run in Set 2, turning an 11-11 stalemate into a 17-11 lead behind a pair of Mari Szews kills. Dominican got to within 18-15, but a 7-1 run by the Green Knights put them ahead 2-0.
 
The Green Knights trailed for much of the third set, finally getting to even at 17-17. But Dominican went on a 5-0 run for a 22-17 lead. St. Norbert scraped back to force a deuce set at 24-24 and had match points at 25-24 and 28-27 but couldn't close out the match.
 
St. Norbert sprinted out to a 9-1 lead in Set 4, with Dominican getting to within 17-13 at one point but the Green Knights were never seriously threatened the rest of the way to close out the win.
 
The Green Knights hit .188, with 60 kills and 26 errors in 181 attempts. Lauren Borchardt had 17 kills, while Mills added 16 and Szews 14 on just 23 attempts. Heidi Colburn had 46 assists. Mills had four service aces, while Borchardt, Volz and Colburn all had two apiece.
 
Claire Leynse finished with 24 digs, while Borchardt added 23. Colburn had 14. Szews had three blocks, while Mills, Borchardt and Anna Kudick all had two apiece.
 
Against Stout, the Green Knights recovered from slow starts in each of the first two sets to rally and record the sweep.
 
St. Norbert fell behind 10-2 in Set 1 before embarking on a 17-6 run to pull ahead 19-16. The Green Knights had trailed 16-14 before a Stout service error preceded a double block by Szews and Colburn and a solo block by Mills. Stout then had an attacking error and a kill by Szews to take its lead. Stout would rebound with a 5-0 run of its own to lead 21-19, but the Green Knights walked the set in with six straight points, fueled by a pair of Mills kills and a Colburn service ace.
 
In what was a wild second set, Stout took a 6-0 lead before St. Norbert eventually battled back to tie it 16-16. The Green Knights had set point at 24-23 before Stout had set points at 25-24 and 26-25. St. Norbert then had set point at 27-26 and 28-27 before the Blue Devils came back to lead 29-28. St. Norbert had sets points again at 30-29 and 31-30 before Stout took a 32-31 lead. The Blue Devils then had a costly foot fault on a serve and Claire Leynse followed with a pair of service aces to put St. Norbert ahead 2-0.
 
St. Norbert held a 13-10 lead in the third set before going on an 8-1 run to build a 21-11 lead and cruise to the hard-fought sweep.
 
The Green Knights hit .240 in the match, with 44 kills and 13 errors in 129 attempts. Mills had 16 kills, while Borchardt had 11 and Szews eight. Colburn finished with 30 assists and four service aces. Leynse had three aces.
 
Colburn had a team-high 20 digs, with Borchardt adding 14 and Leynse 13. Borchardt and Mills had three blocks each, while Szews and Alli Clark had two apiece.