The Missouri State volleyball team dropped its first match of the season against Michigan State Friday afternoon before rebounding to top Florida State in a thrilling five-game marathon and earn head coach Melissa Stokes her 250th career win at the Spartan Invitational inside Jenison Field House in East Lansing, Mich.

The Bears (5-1), lost to Michigan State (2-3) by game scores of 30-24, 30-27 and 30-28. Missouri State won the first two games against the Seminoles (2-1) and eventually triumphed by scores of 30-23, 30-27, 24-30, 17-30 and 15-11.

After watching a 2-0 lead slip away and trailing 5-1 in the deciding fifth game against Florida State, the Bears rallied to tie the score at 6-6 and forced three more ties to make it 11-11. Seniors Sara Thomas and Jamie Adams then gave the Bears a two-point lead with a kill and a block, and FSU committed a pair of attack errors to hand Missouri State the 15-11 victory.

The Bears jumped to the early lead by using four blocks and taking advantage of 14 FSU attack errors in the first game, and then got five of Sara Staubach’s team-high 13 kills to claim game two and a 2-0 lead before intermission.

Florida State posted a sizzling offensive attack in the third game, hitting .562 with 20 kills and just two errors, and followed that performance by turning a 14-14 tie into a 30-17 win in game four before the resilient Bears took the final game.

The Spartans were on the offensive for most of the afternoon match, nearly doubling the Bears in kills (64-34), with two different players reaching the 20 mark. While Michigan State also committed 27 attack errors to 13 for Missouri State, the Spartans finished the contest with a .311 hitting percentage against .241 for the Bears.

The final two games were marked by missed opportunities for the Bears. Missouri State led by as many as eight points in game two (14-6), and were up 20-19 in the final game before being derailed by late Michigan State charges in both games.

Sara Thomas, the reigning Missouri Valley Conference player of the week, had a team-high 11 kills and hit .500, while Staubach had seven putaways against a single error. No other Missouri State player had more than five kills.

Nikki Vandepopulier finished with 11 of the Bears’ 23 team digs.

The Bears finish play at the Spartan Invitational against Kansas at 4 p.m. Saturday.