NSU BOX SCORE | UNLV BOX SCORE
LUBBOCK, Texas -- Morehead State's volleyball team opened the Texas Tech Invitational Friday afternoon with a 3-0 (25-18, 25-21, 25-21) shutout of Northwestern State. In the nightcap, the Eagles took UNLV to five sets before falling 3-2 (25-21, 24-26, 22-25, 25-18, 12-15).
The Eagles are now 2-3 on the season with matches Saturday against Central Arkansas and host Texas Tech.
In the opener against NSU, the Eagles' offense fired on all cylinders. MSU hit .300 for the match with 43 kills and just 13 errors on exactly 100 attacks. MSU's defense also came up solid with 54 digs. Sophomore libero Leslie Schellhaas led the back row with 14 ups.
Redshirt sophomore Aryn Bohannon completed her first double-double of the year with 12 digs and 10 kills via a .310 attack performance. She also landed three service aces. Junior Ellie Roberson led the team in kills for the fourth straight match with 13. Roberson also continued her torrid offensive pace, hitting .455. Emma Keough had eight kills and hit .500.
Junior setter Caitlin Clark nearly had a double-double with 32 assists and nine digs.
Defensively, MSU limited the Demons' hitters to just .057 for the match. NSU's Stacey DiFrancesco led her team with 12 kills.
Against UNLV, the Eagles came out fast by nailing 16 kills and hitting better than .250 to win the opening set 25-21. The pace wasn't able to hold up though as in the second frame MSU had 12 kills but made 11 attack errors. The Eagles trailed 24-21 at one point but kills by Bohannon and redshirt freshman Laura McDermott, plus a UNLV error, tied the contest. UNLV got a kill, and MSU committed an attack error to set the final margin in favor of the Runnin' Rebels 26-24.
Set three proved to be extremely tight. Only as much as a three-point margin separated the squads the entire set. UNLV finally pulled away by scoring the final points to win 25-22. In the fourth set, the Eagles blasted 15 kills and made just three errors en route to a 25-18 victory to send the match to a deciding set. In that fifth set, the teams once again battled to several stalemates, but with the set tied at 11, the Rebels reeled off three points to lead them on the way to the 15-12 win to seal the match.
Roberson posted her fourth 20-kill match of the year with 20 spikes, while McDermott had a career high 16 kills while hitting .500. Bohannon tallied a double-double with 14 kills and 16 digs, and Schellhaas had a team high 20 scoops on defense. Clark did accomplish a double-double too with career highs of 55 assists and 14 digs.
UNLV placed four players in the double digit kill column, led by MacKenzia Moea'l with 20. The Rebels also came up with 18 block assists.
