Dugway volleyball must like to make things dramatic. Cruising through the first two games the Mustangs were looking for a sweep over visiting West Ridge in the home site round of the 1A state tournament.

They, however, dropped the two following games and narrowly escaped the Eagles’ come-from-behind effort 3-2 (25-19, 25-23, 23-25, 23-25 and 15-13) Tuesday in Dugway.

Shelsea Wall led the way for the Mustangs with 16 kills and three aces. Summer Bloyer and Rachel McCarty each chipped in nine kills in the win for Dugway.

As the teams were trying to get a feel for each other in the first game, both Dugway and West Ridge went back and forth with points until the score reached 6-6. That is when the Mustangs went on an eight-point barrage behind the serving of Kylee Morse and a pair of kills from Bloyer and Lindsey Kimler to make the score 14-6.

After a timeout out though, West Ridge was able to recover. A high looping serve of Delia Coulter caused havoc on the Mustang defense to bring the match within 14-11. From there however, Dugway was able to build a couple runs of their own and watched a West Ridge serve from Elizabeth Cann go wide, giving the Mustangs their first game 25-19.

In the middle of the second game, Dugway put together two momentum-building four-point runs behind a couple of kills by Wall and Bloyer to give them a 16-11 lead. West Ridge did forge a late rally by the strong play of Lexi Bingham to cap off a four-point run of their own to tie the score at 21-21.

From there the Mustangs took control. A three-point run to end the second game was capped off by a comanding spike by McCarty down the middle of the court to seal the game 25-23.

With a convincing 2-0 lead, Dugway was looking to empty the stands early with a 3-0 sweep, but West Ridge didn’t just roll over for the Mustangs.

The Eagles built a sizable lead mid-way through the third game on two big four-point runs sparked by the net play of Hanna Royal, giving West Ridge the 8-15 advantage. Dugway would not concede the game to the Eagles however.

With the third game sitting at 18-24 and West Ridge only needing one more point to force a fourth game, but the Mustangs started charging. Dugway reeled off five consecutive points behind the net play of McCarty and Wall and the serving of Breanna Nichols to bring the game to 23-24. But West Ridge snuck out the fourth game on a Dugway spike that sailed long.

From there things got worse for Dugway. West Ridge started the fourth game with nine consecutive points to grab hold of an early lead in the fourth game. The Mustangs managed to make a game out of it and even tied it at 23-23 but the Eagles took advantage of spike again hit long for the second game of the match 23-25 to tie the battle at 2-2, forcing a decisive fifth game.

In this do-or-die game for both teams, it started back-and-forth with an evenly matched first couple of points. That is until Nichols and Wall got in some key kills to give Dugway a 12-9 edge. West Ridge battled back to tie the game at 13-13 with both crowds cheering on every point.

On the next point Dugway lucked out a bit. The serve of Sarah Willette was causing problems for the Mustangs all match but she finally hit one into the net giving Dugway a 14-13 advantage. That only left Morse who took the opportunity to close out the game with a perfectly placed kill on the back line to advance Dugway in the state tournament.

With the win, the Mustangs now travel to the 1A state tournament at Utah Valley University. Their first match takes place Friday at 8 a.m. against Christian Heritage at the McKay Center. For a complete 1A tournament bracket visit www.uhsaa.org.

Jake Gordon: jgordon@tooeletranscript.com