The Austin volleyball team hurdled giant mental block in Packer Gym Thursday night. After a couple of sluggish games against a team it hadn’t beaten in at least a decade, the Packers rallied to beat Owatonna by scores of 12-25, 12-25, 25-15, 25-13, 15-9, giving Austin two straight Big Nine wins for the first time since 2009.

Austin (6-15 overall, 3-5 Big Nine) took a 5-2 lead in the fifth and final game when Lily Holtz came up with a kill and back-to-back aces, but the Huskies (5-19 overall, 1-7 Big Nine) bounced back to go up 6-5. Austin junior Jordyn McCormack had a big response as she slammed down two straight kills to put the Packers up 7-6 and she hammered down another kill to make it 11-6.

McCormack said the Packers had a major gut check moment after they had dropped the first two games of the night.

“We realized that this is the end or we can go all the way. I think we really just kicked in,” McCormack said. “We’ve been in this situation before and that helped us. This season has been full of so many new things and no one expects us to beat any of these teams that we’ve lost to.”

McCormack tallied 11 kills and 15 digs in the win for Austin and she was also instrumental for the Packers when they came back from down 2-1 to beat Faribault on Tuesday night. Austin’s three conference wins this season are the most they’ve had in a season since 2009.

After falling behind early in the first two games, the Packers came out swinging in the third game. Holtz had a block kill to put Austin up 7-1 and Owatonna never got any closer than four the rest of the way. In the fourth game, Austin jumped out to a 9-3 lead.

Austin junior Avery Thompson chipped in five kills and 11 digs and she said the Packers have come together in new ways this season.

“I think we’ve connected a lot more as a team. We know each other’s strengths and weaknesses a lot more than last year and we utilize it more,” Thompson said. “We knew that we could go against them and we knew they had previously beat us. It was really fun to beat a team that most people didn’t expect us to beat.”

Austin head coach Lauren Cost likes how her team is starting to play with pressure, and she’s hoping the squad can continue to progress.

“It’s been a slow process. I think it’s a little bit every day,” Cost said. “We try to do things in practice to put them in pressure situations and force them to work through the team. I think seeing the success over time is helping. It’s fun, but we still have work to do.”

Austin stats: Avery Thompson, 5 kills, 11 digs, 3 ace serves; Elyse Hebrink, 3 kills, 13 digs; Erica Lundberg, 4 kills, 9 digs; Jenna Braaten, 22 set assists; Jordyn McCormack, 11 kills, 15 digs; Kyra Walter, 5 kills; Lilly Holtz, 3 kills, 5 ace serves