Sept. 12, 2009

As the Lady Broncs entered day two of the McNeese State Invitational, UTPA (2-8) started off with a 3-0 loss to McNeese State and finished off with a 3-0 win against Prairie View A&M this Saturday (Sept. 12) at the Memorial Gym in Lake Charles, LA.

McNeese State 3, UTPA 0
McNeese State was on a mission when they entered today's match against UTPA as they quickly defeated UTPA 25-9 in the first set.

Not wanting to face another double-digit loss, the Lady Broncs came back for the second set and lost 25-23. The Lady Broncs came from behind on a 5-3 run to trail the Cowgirls by two (14-12), but lost some of that momentum and trailed by seven after a service ace by McNeese's Deanna Sanchez.

After a timeout by the Lady Broncs, UTPA came back on a 5-0 run to trail by two (20-18), but fell short in the final minutes of play.

The Lady Broncs were unable to recover in the third set and lost 25-15.

Noelle Mayor collected eight kills for a game-high on 16 total attacks (.375) along with one block. Kaitlin Vasquez added five kills and five digs for the Lady Broncs.

McNeese State's Nicole Bowden finished with 10 kills on 16 total attacks (.562) along with two digs and four blocks.

UTPA 3, Prairie View A&M
With two games down at the McNeese State Invitational, the Lady Broncs were going to put a stop to it as they defeated Prairie View A&M in three straight sets.

The Lady Broncs started off with 25-23 wins in the first and second set and a 26-24 win in the third set.

UTPA got off to a late start in the first set, but came back to take the lead after an attack error by PVAMU's Cheri Lindsay. The Panther's then came back from behind to tie the score at 16 after a ball handling error by Marci Logan and took a short lead over the Lady Broncs. But the Lady Broncs tied the score not once but twice (20-20, 21-21) to take the final lead. A kill by Kaitlin Vasquez secured the Lady Broncs first win of the match.

The second set was somewhat of a repeat of the first set, but this time a kill by Noelle Mayor and a block by Sarah Davis and Noelle Mayor secured the second set win.

The Panther's were determined to defeat the Lady Broncs and started off the third set strong as they led throughout most of the set. An attack error by Sapphire Reid would tie the score (15-15) for the Lady Broncs and would be their opportunity to take the lead once and for all.

But the Panther's and Lady Broncs put up a fight as the remaining set included nine ties and 10 lead changes. Ijanae Holman collected the final tie of the set as she recorded a kill. Freshman Sarah Davis secured the final set for the Lady Broncs as she recorded a kill and a block for the last two points of the set.

Sarah Davis finished with three kills, one dig and a career-high eight blocks, while Kaitlin Vasquez added eight kills and 11 digs and Ariana Bermea posted a career-high 20 assists.

At tournament's end, senior Noelle Mayor was selected to the All-Tournament team after finishing the tournament with a total of 16 kills, 51 total attacks (.250), 7 assists, 4 digs and 3 blocks.

The Lady Broncs will have a little less than a week off before they begin conference play as they travel to Vermillion, SD to face Univ. of South Dakota next Thursday (Sept. 17).

UTPA Sports Information