Marquette avenged a regular season loss to Iowa last year by taking care of the Hawkeyes 3-2 in the Golden Eagle’s first home game of the spring season.

“We passed and served much better today, but there is still much room for improvement,” coach Bond Shymansky said. “We’re really working hard with our younger players to get them more experience and our older players continue to be the rock-steady portion of our program.”

Junior Rabbecka Gonyo was pleased with the effort her team gave.

“We didn’t have a good week of practice,” said Gonyo. “We wanted to come out ready and it showed. We came out a lot stronger today.”

Marquette opened the match by dropping the first point, but that would be the only time in the set they would trail. At 4-4, the Golden Eagles and Hawkeys traded mini-runs making it 8-4 Marquette, then 8-7 Marquette, then 11-7 Marquette, before a final Iowa run made it 11-11.  The Golden Eagles would outscore Iowa 14-6 in the last 20 points to close the set with a Danielle Carlson kill for 25-17 victory.

The second set saw the same plot line develop. Marquette took a small early lead at 7-4 before Iowa mounted a run to tie it at 7. The rest was all Marquette as the Golden Eagles outscored Iowa 18-9 to close out the set 25-16. The Hawkeyes inability to serve well did them in. Iowa missed four serves in the set and was never able to mount any extended runs.

The third set was tight throughout and neither team ever held a lead larger than three. Marquette was down 23-20 and looked to be going down, but a missed serve by Iowa ignited a 3-0 run to tie it. After an Iowa point, Carlson smashed a ball for the right side to even the score at 24. The Hawkeyes would have the final say, though, winning the next two points and the set.

Seemingly upset from the third set loss, Marquette came out with guns blazing. A kill by Gonyo put Marquette up 6-2 and started a 13-3 run. Two more Gonyo kills then set up match point. The Golden Eagles didn’t convert on their first two attempts but the third time was the charm as a missed serve by Iowa gave Marquette the match.

The two teams decided to play a fifth game to 15 for the fun of it, after the fourth set. Tied at 10, Iowa grabbed the reigns and won five of the last six points to take the fifth set.