Ever since the spring season, the Michigan volleyball team has worked on serving, passing and blocking, just like every other team in the Big Ten.

But after months of daily practices and preparation, coach Mark Rosen knows what his team needs more than anything this late in the season: wins.

And that’s just what the 14th-ranked Wolverines got this weekend against Purdue and Indiana at Cliff Keen Arena. It was the Wolverines’ first weekend sweep since Sept. 25 and 27 — against the same Purdue and Indiana teams. During the seven-week stretch, the team was just .500 in conference play.

"At this point in the season, you can sense everyone’s urgency," Rosen said. "I think for us, we feel pretty secure that we’re going to get in, but we don’t want to limp into the tournament. We want to run in the tournament."

Against the Hoosiers, Michigan took the first two sets of the match, and all signs pointed to a three-set sweep. But four service aces in the third match by Indiana (4-12 Big Ten, 15-15 overall) and some sloppy defensive play allowed the Hoosiers to jump back into contention.

"When you hit (an attack percentage of) .433, you expect to win a game," Rosen said. "Defensively, we got very casual. They started tooling our block, banging balls off our blocks, and we just kind of sat back and waited for them to lose instead of us going out and winning."

Two sets later, the Wolverines were in what Rosen called a "dog-fight." With the match tied at two sets apiece, sophomore right side hitter Alex Hunt used her powerful serve to throw the Hoosier defense off balance and grab four points for Michigan.

The Wolverines (10-6, 22-7) won the fifth set 15-11, as Hunt led the offense with 18 kills on the night. Senior outside hitter Juliana Paz garnered 15 kills as well.

The Wolverines played their way to a similar outcome against the Boilermakers on Friday. The Wolverines raced out to a 2-0 lead and then squandered the next two sets to set the stage for another five-set match. Michigan boasts a 4-2 record in five-set matches.

Senior captain Megan Bower, like Rosen, noted how this weekend’s matches were critical for possibly securing a higher seed in the NCAA Tournament, and earning the right to host the first two rounds. The last time the Wolverines hosted the beginning stages of the tournament was in 2007.

"At this point in the year, you take wins where you can get them," Rosen said. "When our kids’ backs were against the wall and the match was on the line, they found a way to win. I’ll take that any day."