Box Score

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – The Texas State Bobcats put themselves in play for the second seed in the Sun Belt Conference Tournament with an impressive 3-2 victory (18-25, 25-21, 24-26, 26-24, 15-12) over UALR in Little Rock Friday night. Amari Deardorff took over the fifth set with five kills, outhitting both of the top two Trojans combined, to propel Texas State to victory and improve the Bobcats to 21-11 on the season and 11-6 in SBC play.
 
With the deciding fifth set tied, 9-9, Deardorff devastated UALR with consecutive kills for an 11-9 lead to force a UALR timeout. The Trojans scored out of the timeout, but Deardorff answered with her third kill in four points and her team high 18^th kill of the night.
 
After that, Ashlee Hilbun took over with Texas State's final three kills and the last two kills of the match to clinch it for Texas State.
 
The two seniors combined for 30 kills, both hitting .300 or higher. Each player had stretches of the match in which they could not be stopped. Hilbun also did much of the stopping as she finished with a team high seven blocks to help Texas State tally 12 for the night. Three other Bobcats had at least three blocks or more.
 
Kelsey Weynand was another Bobcat who shined offensively, finishing with 12 kills and 14 digs for her second double-double of the year in what Head Coach Karen Chisum called her best match of the season. She added three aces and four blocks and proved to be the difference in Texas State's win.
 
Libero Sierra Smith led the Bobcats in digs with 17 while Caylin Mahoney finished with 32 assists, 11 digs and seven kills along with three blocks, just three kills short of her second triple-double of the season.
 
Deardorff and Mahoney led the Bobcats in the first set with four kills each, Mahoney doing it on just five attempts for an .800 hitting percentage. She also gave four assists and had four digs. The Trojans were too strong though with 13 first set kills, eight of which came from Sonja Milanovic.
 
The Bobcat defense did do well against UALR's top offensive threat Edina Begic, holding her to just three kills with two errors on 13 attempts for just a .077 hitting percentage in the opening set.
 
Despite Begic's struggles, the Trojans still hit .250 in the first frame while Texas State hit .108.
 
In the second set, the Bobcats moved to a 6-2 rotation and it paid dividends. Texas State upped the team's hitting percentage to .235 in the second set but UALR managed a .300 behind eight more kills from Milanovic. Begic added five kills in the set, but the Bobcats were able to withstand the onslaught.
 
Deardorff continued to hit well, adding three more kills but Hilbun joined the action with four kills on six attempts without an error in the set. Mahoney continued to be a threat to score with two more kills in the second set while splitting the setting duties with Jordan Moore. Mahoney gave out three assists and Moore gave seven in the set, finishing with 14 on the night.
 
Weynand was a factor in the second set with two errorless kills and three digs but the real game changer was her three aces.
 
The third set, always an important set no matter how many a match goes, was back and forth for the entirety of the set. After a string of one-point lead changes, the Bobcats finally built a two-point lead for set point, 24-22. The Trojans called a timeout, however, and stormed back to gain a 2-1 advantage in the match with a 26-24 win in the set.
 
Texas State's defense struggled in the third set against UALR's attack. The Trojans hit .378 in the frame with 18 kills and four errors. Texas State had 13 kills and five errors for a .258 percentage.
 
Hilbun continued to pace the Bobcats with four more kills. After going without a kill in the first set, she combined for eight kills in the second and third sets with just one error.
 
For UALR, Begic continued to rebound from a poor first set. Building on her second set, she nearly doubled her kill count with seven in the third frame, upping her hitting percentage to .303 for the match to that point. Milanovic continued to pester Texas State, putting down six kills and finishing the set hitting .500.
 
The Texas State defense came on strong in the fourth set to help the Bobcats stay alive. They forced a .167 hitting percent from the Trojans with a match high nine errors, seven of which came from the team's top two hitters Begic and Milanovic.
 
As UALR shifted its focus to Hilbun in the middle, Texas State saw Weynand explode for six kills without an error in the set. Deardorff added four more as Texas State put down 16 kills to force a fifth set.
 
The fifth set started much the same way the entire match had gone: back-and-forth. Shelby Vas Matt, however, gave the Bobcats some separation with consecutive aces for a 6-3 lead in the fifth set. The Trojans came back to tie the match, though, at 9-9. That's when seniors Deardorff and Hilbun showed why they're clear leaders of the team with a strong close out for the win.
 
Texas State continues its final regular season road trip with a 12 p.m. Sunday match against Arkansas State. After that, the Bobcats will travel to Troy, Ala., for the Sun Belt Conference Tournament Nov. 21-23.