WAYNE — The Wayne State women’s volleyball team fell behind conference rival Concordia-St. Paul 2-0 at Rice Auditorium on Saturday afternoon but dug its way out of the hole with a reverse sweep over the Golden Bears.

Trailing by the 2-0 deficit after Concordia-St. Paul won the first two sets 27-25 and 25-20, the Wildcats stiffened defensively and used great performances from Channatee Robles, Mia Berg, Chloe Hanel, Anna Borner and Molly Romano to win sets three and four 25-22 and 25-21 to even the match, then took the fifth set 15-12.

“We didn’t play very well in the first couple of sets. We had our chances in the first set. We got to set point but let it slip away,” Wildcat coach Scott Kneifl said. “We didn’t play like ourselves. Then, after the second set, we met out in the hallway and came back and competed our tails off. It’s pretty exciting when you come back against a team like that with a reverse sweep.”

“A team like that” was the No.5-rated team in NCAA Division II in the country according to the American Volleyball Coaches Association, but the Wildcats entered the match as the No. 2 team in the poll.

Robles, the former Norfolk Catholic standout, finished her afternoon with a 20-20 double-double with 22 kills and a career-high 23 digs.

Berg, a University of Nebraska at Kearney transfer, rifled a season-high 23 digs and six blocks.

Hanel, from Clarkson, smacked a dozen kills and registered four blocks.

The libero and Douglas County West graduate from Waterloo, Borner posted 20 digs.

The Wildcat setter, Romano from Council Bluffs Abraham Lincoln, tipped up 51 set assists.

Teammates Mattie Kamery from Minden had 19 digs and Delaney Miller from Centennial High School in Ankeny, Iowa, hit double digits in kills with 10.

In the final set to 15, Wayne State got to even after trailing 5-4 by an attack error by Concordia-St. Paul.

Miller hit a winner to put the Wildcats up 6-5, and the teams traded a couple of kills to even the set at 7-7.

A pair of Golden Bear hitting errors, the first confirmed after a Kneifl challenge, made it 9-7.

CSP hit a kill, then Berg smacked one to the court to make it 10-8.

The set was eventually tied again at 10-10 before the Wildcats went on a 3-0 run to go up 13-10.

Robles started the run with a kill, Hanel smacked her 11th winner of the match to make it 12-10, and the Golden Bears contributed with a ball-handling error.

After a Concordia-St. Paul kill, Robles got her team to match point with her last winner of the day to make it 14-11.

Hanel finished off the match with a mega-slam, and the reverse sweep was complete.

“That was a lot of fun,” Hanel said. “The first two sets we were kind of like ‘oh no,’ but we were confident that we could just take it one point at a time, and we trusted each other and knew we were more than capable to get it done if we kept that trust.

“We have had some really tough matches already this season, so we just had to step it up and trust each other. We showed ourselves we could get it done.”

“It’s so early, we have to get so much better, but this was a great win,” Kneifl said. “This is great for the conference and regionally and all those thing,s and we know we have to get so much better, and this team is driven to get there.”

Wayne State will continue the season with a trip to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, on Thursday to take on Augustana University.