MONTCLAIR, N.J. – Cortland rallied from a 12-9 deficit in the fifth set and the Red Dragons won a back-and-forth five-set thriller at Montclair State, 23-25, 25-20, 25-16, 24-26, 15-13 in non-league women's volleyball action.
 
The Red Dragons (4-1) remain in New Jersey Saturday for two matches at Kean University – Cortland will face the host Cougars at noon and NYU at 2 p.m.
 
Nicole Van Pelt (Montgomery/Valley Central) led Cortland with a career-high 20 kills and added eight digs and two blocks. Hannah Southcott (Princeton, WV) matched her Red Dragon career high with 19 kills and also had 18 digs and four blocks. Caterina Mangogna (Manorville/Eastport-South Manor) also tied her career high with eight kills and added three digs and two blocks.
 
Maya Owens (Nyack) totaled eight kills, four digs and two blocks and Danielle Fisk (Honeoye Falls/Honeoye Falls-Lima) chipped in with six kills and six blocks. Alexa Guedez (Rye/Rye Neck) tallied five kills and a team-high seven blocks. Carly Haegele (Commack) led the Red Dragons with 27 digs, Meadow Wittman (Colden/Springville Griffith Institute) dished out 27 assists and picked up 15 digs, and Megan McMahon (Ballston Spa) contributed 21 assists.
 
Montclair fell to 1-5 on the season, including three five-set losses. Carly Waterman led the Red Hawks with 17 kills and 16 digs, Nadya Ackermanian had 12 kills, Gianna Arias chipped in with five kills and a team-high eight blocks, and Delaney St. Pierre finished with 44 assists, 10 digs and four blocks.
 
Cortland finished with a .172 team attack percentage for the match, including a .290 mark (12 kills, three errors in 31 attempts) in the fifth set. Montclair hit just .099 as a team.
 
Cortland trailed 23-18 in the first set, but rallied to tie it at 23-23 on a run that included two Van Pelt kills and a Ryan Hinshaw (Aurora, IL/Joliet Catholic Academy) ace. Montclair, however, scored the final two points on an error and a Leah Higgins kill. In the second set, Cortland was clinging to a 20-19 lead before scoring four straight points, three on unforced Montclair errors and one on a block by Fisk and Owens. Fisk ended the set with a kill two points later.
 
The Red Dragons used kills by Owens and Southcott and a Van Pelt ace during a 6-0 run in the third set that extended an 11-7 lead to 17-7, and the margin was at least seven the rest of the set. In a similar situation to the first set, Cortland trailed 24-20 in the fourth set before coming back on a kill by Owens, a block by Guedez and Southcott, a Mangogna kill, and a Montclair error to knot the score at 24-24. The Red Hawks, however, tallied the final two points on an Arias kill and a Cortland ballhandling error to force the fifth set.
 
The fifth set was tied at every interval from 1-1 to 7-7. The hosts took a 9-7 lead on kills by Higgins and Waterman, but Cortland tied it on two Van Pelt kills. Montclair seemed to take control at 12-9 after a run that featured Ackermanian and Waterman kills, but Cortland called timeout and then scored four straight points – one on a Van Pelt kill and three straight on Southcott kills.
 
Montclair tied the score at 13-3 on an Ackermanian kill. During the next point, it looked like the Red Hawks were going to take the lead when Cortland's second hit started heading out of bounds toward the Red Dragon bench. Wittman, however, made a play not only to keep the point alive, but her save crossed the court and found the floor on Montclair's side for a dramatic play to give Cortland the lead. A Montclair attack attempt during the following point went out of bounds to give Cortland the victory.