Date/Time/Location: September 21, 2026 at 6 PM in A2 Arena in Spearfish, S.D.

Live Stream: RMAC Network (Pay-Per-View)
Tickets: Tickets can be purchased at the link above.

• Black Hills State is now 6-6 (2-2 RMAC) and has continued to keep a .500 record this early in the season. This is now the latest BHSU has been at .500 in the D2 era passing 2013 where BHSU was 5-5. The Yellow Jackets were able to pull out a massive upset win versus Colorado Christian, which was the first time BHSU has won a game at CCU to get them to 6-5 before falling to CSU Pueblo in three sets. They have also had a big upset over Fort Lewis last week.
• The Yellow Jackets were able to have a 4-4 non-conference schedule after taking out MSU Billings, Western New Mexico, UMary, and Upper Iowa in the non-conference tournaments. BHSU was able to get revenge on UMary, who beat them early in the season as they produced the best hitting percentage in BHSU’s D2 history, hitting .452 over the course of the game with only six attack errors.
• The Yellow Jackets entered the season fresh off a season where they had the most wins in a season since 2021 and the most conference wins since 2022. The Yellow Jackets went 6-20 (2-12 RMAC) last season. They went 3-1 in the 1st International Bank Homecoming Classic before entering RMAC play and pulled out two wins over Chadron, one of them in the regional pod, and a win over Western Colorado in regular conference play.
• The Green and Gold have played in four five set matches going 3-1 this season in such matches. BHSU went 2-2 in five setters last year and are 42-41 since joining D2 in matches that go five sets.
• The Yellow Jackets win over Fort Lewis was the first time since 2021 that BHSU had won their RMAC opener.
• The Yellow Jackets are ranked in the top eight in the RMAC in seven categories. They are ranked sixth in the conference and 82nd in the country in hitting percentage (.214), they are ranked eighth in win-loss percentage (.500), team assists (506), team kills (548), aces per set (1.44), team aces (65), and assists per set (11.24).
• The Yellow Jackets are featuring a pretty new team this year. They are only bringing back three players who started 15 or more games last year and only have five that started more than ten. They graduated five key seniors for the team last year and are bringing in six freshman and one transfer. 
• BHSU was projected to finish 14th in the RMAC Preseason Coaches’ Poll with 43 points, just ahead of Chadron State and one point behind Western Colorado. They are now in a five-way tie for seventh in the RMAC at 2-2.
• The Yellow Jackets top three hitters are all within four kills of each other. Izzy Saiki has been one of the trio of BHSU hitters this year. The senior from Thronton, Colo. is in the midst of a career year. She is the leader on the team with 127 kills with a 2.82 kills per set mark and a .209 hitting percentage. She is also tied for the lead on the team in aces with 20. She also has 98 digs and seven total blocks. She had a career-high 20 kills versus Western New Mexico and had a team-high 26 kills this past weekend with six aces and 23 digs. She had her second double-double of the season with 12 kills and 11 digs versus Upper Iowa. Saiki had her sixth double-digit kill game and third double-double of the year with 18 kills and 15 digs versus CCU. The 15 digs were a career-high and the five aces during that game were also a career-high.
• Zoie Husman has started all ten games this year and after a fantastic tournament in Sioux Falls, she is second on the team with 125 kills and 15 aces. She is second with 105 digs. She also has 14 blocks. Her best game of the year came versus Fort Lewis last week where she had her third double-double of her career with 21 kills and 13 digs. The 21 kills were a career-high and her first time reaching 20 kills. She also had a career-high 24.5 points versus FLC as well as two total blocks. She had 17 kills versus UMary and a .667 hitting percentage, which was also a career-high. She had a 17 kill, 13 dig game versus WNMU, with a  career-high three total blcosk. She had her second double of her season with a 13 kill, 15 dig game versus Upper Iowa, and tied her career high with three blocks. This past weekend, she had 17 kills and 20 digs including a 12 kill, 11-dig double-double against CCU.
• Carsyn Mettler was another top hitter for BHSU this past week. Mettler, who has remained consistent now has a hitting percentage of .300 in six out of 12 games this year. She is third on the team in kills with 123, a team-high .255 hitting percentage, and is third on the team with 16 total blocks. She has reached ten kills in six games this year, including four of the last five. She had a .320 hitting percentage against #6 Washburn, and then a .455 hitting percentage versus UMary. She had 13 kills and two blocks versus Upper Iowa two weekends ago, but she had 28 kills in RMAC Weekend one with 15 versus Fort Lewis and 13 versus WCU. She had a .440 hitting percentage versus WCU. She had 18 kills this past weekend.
• Elena Atkinson and Emma Kruger have had almost identical seasons. After combining for 80 assists last weekend, they combined for 87 this weekend with Kruger leading 49 assists to 38. Kruger sits atop with 225 assists and has averaged 5.0 assists per set this season, while Atkinson has 223 and has averaged 4.93. The latter had a .302 set percentage to the latter’s .368. Atkinson’s best game came against Western New Mexico, where she had 33 assists, which the second most in her entire career. She had a .407 set percentage, which was the second-best on the weekend, only behind MSUB, where she had a .514 set percentage. Kruger’s best game came against Fort Lewis, where she had a  career-high 31 assists and 7 digs with an insane .508 set percentage. She just had a massive 30 assist, 22-dig game versus CCU with a .441 set percentage. When BHSU broke the record for attack percentage in a game in the D2 era against WCU, she had 25 assists with an impressive .568 set percentage. They are ranked tenth and 11th in the RMAC in total assists.
• Keira Thompson has been the top libero for BHSU this year. The junior from Lakewood, Colo. who is in her second season as a Yellow Jacket has started all 12 games at the libero position. She is currently leading the team with 187 digs, reaching the 100-dig mark against Upper Iowa. She is averaging 4.25 digs per set and has seven aces as well. Thompson had her career-high of 29 digs versus Fort Lewis, which past her previous career-high set in the game before versus Upper Iowa of 21. She averaged 5.8 digs per set. Last weekend, Thompson earned her first RMAC Defensive Player of the Week award for having 44 digs in seven sets averaging 6.29 digs per set and reaching 20 digs in each game including 24 digs versus CCU and 20 digs in only three sets versus CSUP.
• Izabel Abril has been one of the other players to start all 12 games this year. Abril is sitting at 81 kills and is leading the team with 25.0 total blocks. She had her Yellow Jacket career-high with 14 kills versus Fort Lewis, where she had a .417 attack percentage, and four total blocks, which is just her second time since joining BHSU reaching ten kills. She matched that mark a week later this past weekend versus Christian, where she had 14 kills on a .458 hitting percentage and four total blocks.
• Peyton McLeod has continued her solid career with 12 starts in ten games this year. She is second on the team in blocks with 22.0 and has 62 kills. McLeod had a career-high nine kills versus UMary in the first tournament, and then matched it again versus Upper Iowa. She then matched it twice this past weekend getting nine kills in both games versus CCU and CSUP with a .553 hitting percentage versus CCU and three total blocks.
• Head coach Grayson DuBose enters his second season with the Yellow Jackets and has a BHSU record of 12-26 (4-14 RMAC) but has 14 years of head coaching experience at the D1 level prior to joining BHSU. He was head coach at Utah State for all 14 years and has a 201-259 career record with two WAC Coach of the Year awards and one NCAA Division 1 Tournament appearance. DuBose was able to finally get his 200th career win against Fort Lewis in the five-set thriller.

• Chadron State currently sits at 6-6 (1-3 RMAC) after going 1-1 last weekend with a win over Western Colorado and a loss to Fort Lewis in three sets. So far, in four RMAC games, CSC has gone to five sets three times with losses to Christian and Pueblo and a win over WCU. That win over Western was only their fourth RMAC win in three years and first since beating Western last year early in the season.
• Their non-conference schedule was quite successful as Chadron took down Lake Superior State and Minnesota Crookston in the Hardrocker Tournament and then took out UMary, Upper Iowa, and Sioux Falls in the Sioux Falls Classic going 5-3 in non-conference play.
• The Eagles are 2-3 in road games this year with the wins over Western and Sioux Falls, but with losses to South Dakota Mines, Augustana, and Fort Lewis. They went 0-10 in road games last year.
• The Eagles are top 70 in the country in six stats this year. They are 16th in attacks per set (38.47), 45th in blocks per set (2.11), 49th in total blocks (95.0), 50th in digs per set, which leads the RMAC (16.51), 57th in total attacks (1,731), and 70th in team digs (743).
• The Eagles were picked 15th in the RMAC Preseason Coaches’ Poll with 38 points, just behind BHSU. They were coming off a year where they went 5-21 (1-13 RMAC) and finished 14th in the conference. They are currently in a tie for 12th at 1-3.
• Sarah Meservey has been the big reason why they are one of the top blocking teams in the RMAC. Meservey, a junior middle blocker from Spanish Fork, Utah, has 51 total blocks, which is 23rd in the nation and is averaging 1.13 blocks per set, which is 25th in the nation. She has had at least four blocks in nine games and had a season-high seven versus CSU Pueblo. This past weekend, she had five blocks, with all of them coming against Western Colorado as she was held without a block for the first time this season versus Fort Lewis.
• Mataya Ward is back for the Eagles and is the leading hitter again. The Belle Fourche, S.D. native currently leads the team in kills with 137, points with 153, and is second in aces with 11. She also has 57 digs and ten blocks. Ward has reached ten or more kills in seven games this season and has at least 15 in three of them. She just had easily her best game of the season versus the Mountaineers as she had a season-high 21 kills, a season-high nine digs, and three aces with a .413 hitting percentage.
• Avery Lacy is the top libero for CSC. Lacy, who is a senior from Windsor, Colorado, is sixth in the RMAC in total digs with 192 and sixth in digs per set at 4.27. She also is eighth in assists per set (.40), and is leading the team and fifth in the conference in total aces with 18. She has had double-digit digs in all but two games this year and has reached 20 three times. She’s had a season-high 24 digs twice. First versus Lake Superior State and second versus CSU Pueblo. Last weekend, she had 29 digs with 16 versus WCU and one ace.
• Jillian Donovan is once again the sole setter for Chadron. Donovan, a sophomore from Lincoln, has 280 assists this year, which is sixth in the conference and 6.36 assists per set, which is fifth in the RMAC. Donovan has had 20 assists in eight of 12 games this year including a season-high 42 assists versus CCU. She is also at 109 digs and has reached double digits six times. This past weekend after a rough game versus FLC, she rebounded with a 38 assist performance versus Western.
• Head Coach Jennifer Stadler is in her eighth season in charge of the Chadron State volleyball program in 2026, accumulating a 62-121 record in her first seven seasons. The former BHSU player, assistant coach, and interim head coach is one win away from matching her third highest winning season of her CSC career. She also spent eight years prior at Sheridan College.

SERIES HISTORY

• Since joining D2, Chadron holds the series lead at 15-19 with BHSU winning most in the early 2010s. Since 2020, BHSU is 5-8 versus the Eagles.
• Last year, the Yellow Jackets met three times with the Eagles making this the fourth matchup between the regional foes in under a year. BHSU was able to take two out of three versus Chadron last year winning the first two in Spearfish 3-2 and 3-0 before losing the third in the RMAC Power Pod 0-3. The Green and Gold reversed swept Chadron in the opening meeting last year and then won six straight sets sweeping the second match before falling in all three sets in Chadron.