SAN ANGELO, Texas – Senior Kalinda Graves had a career-high 36 digs, Dedra Brown had a match-high 24 kills and Kelsey Washington had a double-double with 16 kills and 20 digs Thursday afternoon, but it wasn’t enough as the sixth-seeded Texas A&M-Kingsville volleyball team fell 3-2 (13-25, 25-20, 25-23, 22-25, 15-13) to third-seed Tarleton State in the opening match of the Lone Star Conference Championship in volleyball.
With the loss, the Javelinas season comes to an end at 17-14, while the TexAnns move to 23-8. The two sides had split their regular-season matchups 1-1.
Entering the final set tied 2-2, Kingsville jumped out to an early 9-5 lead in the tie-breaking set. Brown led the way with two kills early.
Tarleton rallied back to tie the game at nine as the duo of Stacie Murrah and Nikki McNorton blocked an attempt by Brown.
Down the stretch the teams were tied at 11 all, 12-12 and 13-13 after a Washington kill. Murrah broke the tie at 13 with a kill for match point. The match ended with an attack error by Washington.
TAMUK flew out of the gates winning the opening set 25-13. The Javelinas out-hit the TexAnns .282 to .025. Kelsee Felux, who finished with 13 kills, had five in the opening set, while Washington had four. Bethany Friesenhahn had six digs to lead the way.
Neither team hit well in set two. Kingsville hit .016, while TSU had a .059 percentage. The TexAnns evened the match at 25-20. The Javelinas took an early lead in the second set at 5-1 behind four attack errors by TSU and maintained a four-point margin at 14-10. Down 15-12, Tarleton used a 5-0 lead to take its second lead of the set and never relinquished it.
The offenses for both sides picked up in the third set. Kingsville hit .308, but was just barely out-hit by the TexAnns .309. The set saw 11 ties the last at 23-23. The Javelinas took a 23-22 lead in the set on a kill by Brown, but TSU scored the final points of the set.
Kingsville forced a game five with a 25-22 win. Brown had five kills to lead the way and Graves had 10 digs. The Javelinas forced Tarleton to hit -.022 for the fourth set.
In all, five Javelinas had double-digit digs as the team recorded 121 a season-high. Aside from Graves’ 36 and Washington’s 20, Sarah Fountain had 18, Friesenhahn 16, and Insell 15. Fountain had 58 assists