Nina Moorer and Caelyn Emmerling each had 10 kills as Texas State (4-4) broke a three-match skid with a 26-24, 25-23, 25-21 sweep against the Incarnate Word Cardinals at the Texas State Invitational, Saturday afternoon at Strahan Arena.
“I’m super proud of the bounce back we had. We struggled a little bit after what we did Thursday night. Last night, too, we weren’t happy with our performance, so we challenged them a little bit today,” Texas State head coach Sean Huiet said. “One of the things we’ve been stressing is that we want to be hard to score on, and I think our defense did really, really good tonight. To dig 76 balls in a three-set match is big time. Really proud of how we bounced back today to get back on the winning way.”
Noticeably missing from the floor were seniors Samantha Wunsch and Bailey Hanner, as neither touched the court the entire match.
“I was pretty blunt, I’m not happy with the performance from some of our upperclassmen and our seniors,” Huiet said in regards to the new look lineup. “I thought our freshmen went in and did their job…to see them go in and do it shows that on any day someone will step up and help this team.
The back-and-forth scoring in the first set set the tone for the rest of the match. Texas State managed to open up an 18-12 lead following a timeout, but UIW stayed scrappy, tying the first set at 24-24. With the set tied, Texas State rattled off the next two points, leading to the 26-24 set one win to take a 1-0 lead.
Midway through the second set, Incarnate Word managed to gain momentum by capitalizing on Bobcat errors, leading to a 12-9 advantage. Texas State regained momentum and took the lead back; however, UIW continued to keep the score tight, tying the match at 16-16. The second set never saw a deficit larger than three points, but a service error by UIW gave Texas State the 25-23 win in set two.
The Bobcats were in control for much of the third set, UIW, however, sticking to the match theme, stayed on Texas State’s hip and managed to tie the third set at 16-all. A much-needed 4-0 run from the Bobcats put Texas State comfortably ahead before Ally Adair finished the match with a kill, putting set 3 in the books at 25-21.
The Bobcats will get back on the court when they travel to Palo Alto for the Stanford Tournament from September 19-21. Texas State will face the trio of UCLA, Hawaii and the host Stanford Cardinal.
Texas State’s first match against UCLA is set for 6 p.m. Friday, Sep. 19, at Stanford Maples Pavilion in Palo Alto, California. The match will be streaming on ESPN+.
