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HOUSTON – The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) volleyball team earned its first victory of the season by beating Bethune-Cookman University (BCU) 3-1 (25-12, 18-25, 25-9, 25-19) on Friday at Sharp Gym as part of the 2019 Barcelona Sports Invitational.
 
Sophomore Sarah Cruzled UTRGV (1-1) with 18 kills and nine digs. Senior Barbara Silva recorded 13 kills on .476 hitting. Junior Veronika Jandova posted a career-high tying 11 kills on .611 hitting with a career-high four aces and two blocks. Junior Los Fresnos alum Jackie Kingsbury recorded a career-high tying seven kills with a career-high 11 digs. Senior McAllen Memorial alum Draik Banks also had seven kills, doing so on .467 hitting. Junior Debora Nazario dished out a match-high 50 assists with eight digs.
 
Faith Landreneaux led BCU (0-2) with six kills.
 
Two kills by Cruz and a pair of aces by junior Samaret Caraballo helped UTRGV jump out to a 9-3 lead in the first set. UTRGV never let up, going up 20-6 at the end of a 5-0 run that featured a kill and two aces by Jandova. Then, after BCU climbed to within 12, a Silva kill ended the set.
 
BCU won the second set and then was within 5-6 in the third set. That's when Kingsbury came up with two kills and an ace to help UTRGV take a 12-6 lead. Then, after an error made it a five-point set, Cruz had two kills during a 9-0 run to put UTRGV up 21-7. Two serves later, UTRGV used two kills by Banks and one by Cruz to end the set.
 
The fourth set was tight for the first 25 serves. That's when a Silva kill sparked a 6-1 run to put UTRGV up 20-14. BCU got as close as five three times, including 19-24, before a Banks kill ended the match.
 
UTRGV closes out the tournament on Saturday at 2:30 p.m. against host Houston Baptist.

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