GRAND FORKS, N.D. - The 2010 University of North Dakota volleyball team was the best in program history. The trek to that claim was not an easy one though. Especially considering, the Sioux had to better a 2009 team that went 22-6 and won the first conference regular season and tournament titles in program history. 

After the dust settled, the records fell, the plethora of individual awards were hauled in, the team trophies were won again and a 25-5 record were posted, there was little doubt this was indeed the best team to wear the Green and White.

Here is a closer look at all those achievements, milestones and highlights from the magical campaign.   

DIFFERENT SEASON, SAME RESULT: For the second straight season, the Fighting Sioux volleyball team captured both the Great West regular season and tournament titles en route to posting a 25-5 record. UND made a clean sweep of GWC regular season play, winning all 12 league matches, then swept Texas-Pan American in the Great West Tournament semifinals before overcoming a shaky first set to defeat South Dakota in four sets in the title match. 

SMED GARNERS TOURNEY MVP HONORS: Junior Annika Smed had a match-high 18 kills in the GWC championship match to secure tournament MVP honors. Smed had double-double efforts in both matches, posting 12 kills and 12 digs in the semifinal win over Texas-Pan American. With her fifth dig against the Broncs, Smed moved into the 1,000-dig club at UND. She also added 14 digs against the Coyotes in the finale. 

JOKI, TURNER JOIN MVP SMED ON ALL-TOURNEY TEAM: Senior Erin Joki and freshman Erica Turner joined junior Annika Smed on the GWC All-Tournament team. Joki had 11 kills in the title match and her last one clinched the 15th straight victory for UND, tying a program record. Turner had 18 digs as UND held the Coyotes to .145 hitting percentage. The Sioux offense woke up after a shaky start in the first set to finish with a .229 attack percentage.

SIOUX COLLECT LOTS OF HARDWARE: The Fighting Sioux had the Friday off during the opening round of the Great West Conference Tournament, but being idle on the court did not keep the squad out of the news. League officials announced the individual honors and 2010 All-Great West volleyball teams prior to the opening quarterfinal match and the top-seeded Fighting Sioux collected four of those individual accolades and had a quartet of players named to the first team. UND also had a pair of players named to the All-Newcomer team.

Senior captain Erin Joki was named the Player of the Year, while freshman Ellen Krueger earned both Setter of the Year and Freshman of the Year honors. Head coach Ashley Hardee collected his second straight GWC Coach of the Year accolade as well. Joki and Krueger were joined on the All-GWC first team by junior outside hitters Devin Trefz and Annika Smed. Trefz picked up her second consecutive first team honor, while Smed made her first team debut after earning second team honors as a sophomore. Krueger picked up one more honor as she was also named to the All-Newcomer team along with redshirt freshman Ronni Munkeby (Lisbon, N.D.). 

PERFECTION: The Fighting Sioux volleyball team capped its perfect run through the Great West Conference regular season slate by picking up a pair of sweeps in the Lone Star State during the final weekend of league play.  UND moved to 11-0 with a straight-set victory over Houston Baptist (Nov. 11) and completed the 12-0 campaign with a sweep of Texas-Pan American (Nov. 13). The Sioux joined seven other Division I schools that held perfect records in their respective conferences 2010. UND has now won 21 straight GWC regular season matches dating back to last season.    

STREAKING SIOUX: The victory in the Great West championship match not only secured the team's second straight tournament title, but it also extended its winning streak to 15 straight. The 15 consecutive wins are the most ever in one season and equaled the program mark set earlier in the season when the 2009 team won 12 straight to close out last year's campaign and this year's club won three straight before falling to Drake in the North Dakota Classic championship match. 

HARDEE BEGINNINGS: Head coach Ashley Hardee is off to the best two-year start in UND volleyball history and the Great West Conference has taken notice, naming him Coach of the Year in both of those seasons. His first two squads combined for a 47-11 record, which equates to an .810 winning percentage. The 47 wins in back-to-back seasons trail only the 1989 and 1990 clubs that tallied 48 wins (30 losses) for head coach Lisa Kissee. Hardee has led the program to its first two conference regular season and tournament titles as well. His 47 triumphs already put him No. 4 on the list in career wins at UND. Kissee leads the program's all-time list of coaches (10) with 137 career victories.

PROGRAM RISING: There are 328 Division I volleyball programs in the NCAA and the Fighting Sioux moved into the top 100 of the NCAA's RPI following their 25-5 run to the Great West Conference regular season and tournament titles. That is a 51-spot improvement from where the club finished in 2009 (140) after its first full season at the DI level. According to Richkern.com, a computer-based ranking system of all the teams in DI volleyball, the Sioux have moved up from a ranking of No. 222 following the 2008 season all the way to No. 63 following the 2010 campaign.

SWEEPING SUCCESS: The Fighting Sioux volleyball team has a knack for beating opponents in straight sets. For the second straight year, nine of their victories in Great West play came via the sweep. In the past two years, UND has swept Chicago State, Houston Baptist, NJIT and Texas-Pan American in all four meetings with those respective teams. The Sioux have also swept South Dakota in two of their four victories over the Coyotes. Utah Valley is the only league team to have not been swept by the Sioux. The Wolverines have also dealt UND its only loss since joining the Great West Conference. UVU defeated the Sioux in Orem last October. The Sioux have won 21 straight in league play since that setback.

BETTY BE KIND: Since moving up to the Division I ranks, the Fighting Sioux have posted a 23-2 record on their home court at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center. UND posted a 7-1 record in 2008 and went unblemished at home for the first time in program history in 2009, posting an 8-0 record in Grand Forks. This season, the Sioux went 3-1 at the North Dakota Classic in late August, dropping only a five-set match to Drake. The setback to the Bulldogs snapped a school record 11-match home winning streak. The Sioux returned to “The Betty” on Oct. 2 and started what ended up being a perfect 6-0 home record in GWC action.

SIOUX SEND OUT SENIORS WITH SECOND STRAIGHT GREAT WEST TITLE: The Fighting Sioux volleyball team sent out its senior duo in championship fashion on Nov. 6, defeating NJIT in straight sets at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center. UND's 11th straight victory clinched the outright Great West regular season title for the second straight campaign. Senior Erin Joki led the way for UND with 13 kills as the offense hit .380 and had 47 kills in the team's fourth straight sweep of the Highlanders. Fellow senior Courtney Halvorson added two digs, a kill and an ace.

 

FANS SHATTER ATTENDANCE MARKS: A record crowd of 1,038 showed up to watch UND knock off South Dakota, 3-1, on Oct. 14 at “The Betty”.  It was the second straight year that the Dig Pink match set an attendance record (891 vs. NJIT, 10/23/09). However, that was not the record which was broken. The old mark of 1,000 fans was established on Senior Day (Nov. 14, 2009) a season ago when UND clinched the outright Great West title with a 3-2 victory over the Coyotes. The  mark was set three diffent times during the 2009 season when UND was a perfect 8-0 record on its home court. The 2010 season has been a great year for attendance as well. The Sioux established seven of the top 10 all-time attendance marks in 2010 as the club reeled off a 9-1 record at “The Betty”.

HISTORY MAKERS: With their sweep of Chicago State on Nov. 4, the Fighting Sioux reached the 20-win plateau for the third straight season, marking the first time that has been done in program history. The 2008 team went 24-8 in the first season of the Division I transition and second-year head coach Ashley Hardee has posted a 43-11 (22-6 in 2009) record in his two-year stint in Grand Forks.

20-20: Head coach Ashley Hardee was just the second coach in UND history to guide his club to back-to-back 20 win seasons. He was the first to achieve the feat in his first two seasons at the school. The 47 wins in back-to-back campaigns fell oen shy of the program record of 48 set by the 1989 and 1990 clubs coached by Lisa Kissee.

KEEP IT UNDER .200: The Sioux have posted a 21-2 record this season when their opponents hit under .200 for a match. The best defensive effort of the season actually came in the season-opening sweep of San Jose State when the Spartans hit -.013 (18k-19e-78a). On the contrast, when teams do hit .200 or better, UND is just 4-3 on the campaign. For the season, opponents are hitting just .145 overall and just .132 in league play against the Sioux defense. 

TREFZ BECOMES 13th MEMBER OF UND'S 1,000-KILL CLUB: Junior Devin Trefz became the 13th member of UND's 1,000-kill club with her third kill of the match against Chicago State on Nov. 4. The history-making kill occured in the second set as the Sioux would go on to sweep the Cougars. Trefz finished with eight kills in the contest and has put together three consecutive 300-plus kill seasons during her time at UND. She finished her junior campaign just outside the career top 10 list at UND with 1,043 kills.

COLLECTIONS AGENT: Junior Annika Smed posted a career-high 15 double-doubles this season, moving past her total of 10 she set as a sophomore in 2009. Smed also registered a second straight 300-kill, 300-dig season and became the 13th player in program history to reach 1,000 career digs with a 12-dig effort in the GWC semifinal victory over UTPA. She finished the season with 326 kills and 344 digs, just two shy of the team lead, and sits just outside UND's top 10 list for career digs with 1,022.

SWAT PARTY: Junior Tiara Russell and redshirt freshman Ronni Munkeby have emerged as the top blocking duo in the Great West Conference this season. Russell ranked second in the league with a 1.03 blocks/set average, while Munkeby was close behind in fourth at 1.01/set. Munkeby increased that average in GWC games to a 0.97/set average, which ranked second among league players. Russell collected 110 and her 98 block assists were the eighth highes single-season total in program history. Munkeby finished the campaign with 73 total blocks.

  

KRUEGER RISING: UND was the top attacking team in the Great West Conference and its top hitting trio all ranked in the top seven in kills/set. Those three attackers benefitted from the improved play of true freshman Ellen Krueger. Pressed into the full-time starting role, Krueger flourished late in the season and led  all GWC players with a 10.60 assists/set average. In league play, she also topped the charts with an 11.55 assists/set average. The Lakeville, Minn., native posted a career-high 57 assists in a 3-2 victory over Utah Valley, helping the Sioux hit .305 as a team. She had 10, 40-plus assist matches to her credit and also collected five double-doubles. She even earned the leagues' defensive player of the week honor on Oct. 18.

MILESTONE DIG: With her final dig in the sweep of South Dakota on Sept. 25, senior captain Courtney Halvorson registered the 1,000th dig of her UND career. Halvorson finished the season third on the team with 322 digs, bringing her career total to 1,071.

JOKI, MUNKEBY SHARE GREAT WEST WEEKLY ACCOLADES: Redshirt freshman Ronni Munkeby became the sixth different Sioux player to earn a Great West weekly honor and senior captain Erin Joki claimed her second after league officials announced last week's recipients on Nov. 16. Munkeby shared the defensive honor with Houston Baptist's Courtney Whittleman, while Joki shared the offensive honor with the Huskies' Isis Gardner. For Munkeby, it is her first career accolade, while Joki now has three and is the first UND player to double-up on weekly honors this season. 

KRUEGER BECOMES FIFTH SIOUX TO EARN WEEKLY LEAGUE HONORS:  When doling out weekly defensive awards, a setter is usually not the first candidate for conference officials to consider. But, when someone in your league turns in an all-around performance like the one Ellen Krueger put together for the Fighting Sioux on Oct. 14 against rival South Dakota, thinking outside the box can be justified. And, that is exactly what happened when GWC officials named Krueger their Defensive Player of the Week on Oct. 19. The true freshman had a career-high 15 digs and added three block assists in the 3-1 victory over the Coyotes as UND built a two-game cushion on the rest of the Great West teams.

JOKI TABS GREAT WEST WEEKLY ACCOLADE: Senior Erin Joki was the fourth Fighting Sioux player to earn a weekly honor from the Great West when league officials named her the Co-Offensive Player of the Week on Oct. 5. Joki led UND with 17 kills in a 3-1 victory over Utah Valley (Oct. 2). The 17 kills equaled Joki's career-high that she set earlier this season in a home match against Gonzaga (Aug. 28). 

RUSSELL COLLECTS GREAT WEST WEEKLY DEFENSIVE HONOR: Junior Tiara Russell became the second Sioux player to earn Great West Defensive Player of the Week honors this season, league officials announced on Sept. 28. UND opened league play with a sweep of South Dakota as Russell and the Sioux defense limited the Coyotes to a .073 hitting percentage. Russell had seven total blocks, including five in the pivotal second set that the UND dominated (25-13). 

SIOUX SWEEP FIRST GREAT WEST WEEKLY HONORS: Senior libero Courtney Halvorson and junior outside hitter Devin Trefz were both honored on Aug. 30 by the Great West, as league officials announced their first volleyball weekly honors of the 2010 season. Halvorson collected the first weekly accolade of her career, being named the defensive player of the week, while  Trefz earned her second offensive player of the week honor.