Walking around the Worthen Arena court following Friday's match against IPFW, coach Joel Walton looked up towards the ceiling and gave a deep sigh.
After spending almost 90 minutes watching the No. 7 Ball State University men's volleyball team comeback from a two-game deficit to win, Walton said he couldn't help but feel relieved to walk away without a loss.
The five-game win extend the Cardinals' winning streak to 10 matches and maintained their first place status in the Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association.
"There is a danger with the wins some of our guys have been getting recently," Walton said. "Our guys are starting to believe we are a great, great team and not realizing how hard we've had to work to get to this point and realizing it's going to take this same type of work ethic and focus to finish this season the way we want it to go."
The Cardinals entered the match against the Mastodons with their highest ranking in the national coaches poll since the 2003 season.
Walton said his team looked scared at the beginning of the match, as evidenced with IPFW stopping five game points in the first game before winning in overtime.
"I'm not pleased with how we started, I'm not pleased we gave that first game away," Walton said. "To have the heart and the ability to comeback and win the match, it means a lot about our guys."
In the win, outside attacker Patrick Durbin had a career-high 29 kills, with 20 kills in games three through five. The 29 kills is the third most for a Ball State player in a single match during the rally-scoring era.
Walton said one of the reasons Durbin was successful Friday was because IPFW's starting middle attacker Josh Stewart had to leave the match at the beginning of game three due to a lower-leg injury. Despite Stewart returning in game four, the Cardinals were able to set more balls to their outside attackers with the Mastodons' middle blocking being weaker, Walton said.
In addition, Durbin said he benefited from setter Ethan Pheister running a diverse offense and setting every player on the court. Pheister had a career-high 75 assists - the third most assists for a single match in school history during the rally-scoring era.
Along with Durbin, both outside attackers Todd Chamberlain and Marcus Imwalle had more than 15 kills in the match.
"We continue as a team to find different ways to win each night, and I don't know if there is a more complimentary statement I could make about team," Walton said.
The Cardinals then swept Quincy University on Saturday to extend their winning streak to 11 matches, their longest since the 2006 season.
With two conference matches remaining in the season, Ball State is half-a-match ahead of second place No. 10 Ohio State University.
The Cardinals next conference match will be against Ohio State on April 10 in Columbus, Ohio. A win in that match would clinch the Cardinals' first regular season MIVA championship since 2002 and gives them home-court advantage throughout the MIVA Tournament.
"It's a good feeling and it's been the goal of our season," Chamberlain said. "We set it at the beginning of the year that we want to host the MIVA Tournament here."
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