[Men's Volleyball] SAU gets big early-season win at No. 6 Cardinal Stritch

On the road, trailing two-sets-to-one and down 5-0 in the fourth against the No. 6-ranked team in the country, the Bees were in danger of dropping to 1-2 in the conference.

But with their backs against the wall, the Bees rallied for a 25-21, 22-25, 25-27, 25-22, 15-11 win at Cardinal Stritch Thursday night.

Coming out of a timeout facing the 5-0 deficit, St. Ambrose climbed back into the match by winning four straight points, the last three coming on a solo block from Austin Royer and two blocks from Zach Schmidt.

SAU finally took the lead in the fourth on a three-point run, with Scott MacGillis putting down two kills during the spurt that put SAU in front 13-12. The Bees never trailed the rest of the set. At 23-22, Levi Vermuelen had back-to-back kills to extend the match to a fifth set.

In the fifth, St. Ambrose fell behind 2-0 and trailed as late as 8-7. A Schmidt kill broke a 9-9 tie and Riley Anderson pushed the lead to 11-9 with an ace. A Cardinal Stritch setting error gave the Bees a 12-9 lead. Two kills from MacGillis and another from Jaylen Clark closed out the 3-2 victory.