In a thrilling five-set match, the Utah Valley University volleyball team used a clutch 6-1 run in the fifth set to defeat New Mexico State for only the second time in program history on Saturday afternoon at Lockhart Arena (22-25, 25-17, 22-25, 25-20, 15-10).
With the victory, the Wolverines improve to 8-12 overall and 3-2 in WAC play, while New Mexico State drops to 11-7 and 3-2 in conference play with the defeat.
Madison Dennison, the current NCAA leader in blocks, led the Wolverines with seven blocks and 16 kills. Lexi Thompson pitched in 14 kills for Utah Valley and Sierra Starley recorded match highs with 44 assists and a perfect 1.000 attack percentage. Kassandra Tohm had a game-high 24 kills for New Mexico State in the loss.
"We passed better and sided out when we needed to. That was the key," head UVU coach Sam Atoa said. "We did a nice job of blocking the other night against UTRGV, but our offense wasn't very good. We were able to do both today, which was huge for us. I was really proud of the girls and their efforts today."
The Aggies got off to a fast start in set one, jumping out to a 7-2 lead. Four service errors by New Mexico State sparked multiple runs for the Wolverines, but Utah Valley was plagued by three service errors of their own. The Wolverines put together a 3-0 run to take an 18-17 lead behind five kills from Dennison and four more from Alexis Davies on the set. From there, the two sides traded points until a ball-handling violation and attacking error from UVU gave New Mexico State back-to-back points to finish off the set (25-22). Tohm and Sasha-Lee Thomas led the way for the Aggies with six kills apiece.
Set two started off with both teams exchanging points to get to a 7-7 tie before UVU used a four-point run to jump out to an 11-7 lead. The Wolverines went on to extend their lead to 18-13, and NM State was unable to cut the deficit to less than four for the remainder of the set. A pair of kills from Brighton Taylor helped Utah Valley to put the set away at 25-17. Thompson also put away four kills on .500 hitting.
In similar fashion to set two, the two sides traded points to tie the third game at 7-7 before a pair of hitting errors from NM State and back-to-back service aces by Kristen Allred helped UVU to jump out to an 11-7 lead. The Aggies battled back to tie the set at 13-13, and it remained close until consecutive kills from Allred and Dennison fueled a 3-0 run to put UVU up 20-17. New Mexico State then used a 5-0 run of its own to go up 22-20 and finished off the set with a block assist from Thomas and Julianna Salanoa.
The fourth set opened with multiple errors from both teams, and New Mexico State used a service ace from Natalie Mikels to tie the set at 11-11. The Wolverines countered with a 4-1 run on a kill from Allred and back-to-back kills by Dennison to take a 15-12 lead into the media timeout. Coming out of the timeout, the Aggies reeled off a 4-0 run to go up 16-15, but UVU responded with three-straight points, including a solo block from Starley to regain the lead. Later in the set with the score 21-19, UVU went on a key 4-1 run to send the match to a decisive fifth set.
UVU jumped out to a 3-1 start in the decisive fifth set and maintained the two-point lead at 8-6 until the teams switched sides of the court. A block assist from Davies and Taylor after the switch extended the lead to three, but New Mexico State scored three-consecutive points to tie things up at nine. The Wolverines responded with a 5-0 run to go up 14-10, and Dennison recorded her team-high 16th kill to put away the match for Utah Valley.
The win halted the Aggies' seven-match series winning streak over the Wolverines.
"This was a big win. We've struggled against New Mexico State recently, so this was key to keep us in the top half of the conference standings," Atoa said. "Now we have to take care of other things. We'll focus on our upcoming matches on the road. If we can turn things around in the second half of the season, like we did last year, I like our chances."
As a team in the contest, the Wolverines outhit the Aggies, .257 to .203, as well as outblocked NMSU, 12.0 to 8.0.
The Wolverines return to the court on Thursday, Oct. 12, to face Chicago State in game one of a two-game conference road trip in the Windy City. The match is set to begin at 6:00 p.m. MT. Following the trip to Chicago, UVU will head to Kansas City to take on UMKC on Saturday, Oct. 14, at noon.
James Warnick is an assistant sports information director at Utah Valley University. For more information about Wolverine athletics, visit GoUVU.com.