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West Virginia State University Athletics

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VB23 team beats UC
Photo: Todd Griffith
2
Charleston (WV) UCM 24-9,11-4 MEC
3
Winner West Virginia St. WVSt 24-4,14-1 MEC
Charleston (WV) UCM
24-9,11-4 MEC
2
Final
3
West Virginia St. WVSt
24-4,14-1 MEC
Winner
Set Scores
Team 1 2 3 4 5 F
Charleston (WV) UCM 22 16 25 27 9 (2)
West Virginia St. WVSt 25 25 20 25 15 (3)

Game Recap: Women's Volleyball | | Bryan Shepherd, Assistant Sports Information Director

WVSU outlasts UC in five sets in front of a record crowd

INSTITUTE, W.Va. – It took five sets, but West Virginia State was able to avenge their lone loss on their Mountain East schedule Thursday night inside the Walker Convocation Center. There were 965 fans in attendance to see the No. 1 and No. 2 team in the Mountain East South Division do battle, a record crowd to watch a volleyball match. State hit .471 in the deciding set while holding UC to .111 to take the five set victory.

Diamond'Nique Young matched two career highs with 20 kills, 22.5 points, and set a third season high with three digs. Young also rejected five Golden Eagle attacks. Kaitlyn Cabral ended with a double-double, slamming 16 kills and gathering 13 digs. Baby Moleni also ended with double-digit kills with 11. Valencia Wilder hit .750 in the match, killing six balls on eight attacks.

Everyone contributed to the defense for State. The team had 57 digs on the night, but only Cabral had more than nine digs.

Emma Shepherd, Riley Hoff, and Pia Selke all had double-digit kills for UC with 17, 14, and 11, respectively.

Set one was back-and-forth all the way through to the waning moments of the stanza when State took three straight point with kills from Cabral and Moleni, but a UC attack that was fired into the net was enough for Tyler Kanelos to call UC's first timeout of the match with State up 18-15. The two teams traded the next six points. A kill from Young gave State three attempts at set point and Young succeeded on the second attempt, 25-22.

State jumped into the lead in the second set and never looked back. UC never got closer then 2-1. At 9-8, a UC service error gave Alex Darby serve and Jacklyn Simms fired it straight through a UC block, 11-8. UC scored then Moleni fired the ball to the right side of the court and Young picked up two more kills followed by a Simms kill, 15-9. State went on three more 3-0 runs to take a 10 point lead in the set, 22-12. UC grabbed one more point, but Beer and Simms rejected UC's final attack of the set to put State up 2-0 in the match.

The third set was tight up until 16-16 when UC strung together a 6-2 run putting UC up by five points. That differential would be the final as WVSU fell in set three 25-20 forcing a fourth set for the first time all season at home. State hit .152 in the set while UC hit .250.

UC looked like they were going to force a deciding set early when they went up 24-19, but State powered through and forced a UC timeout with WVSU within a point at 24-23. A Young kill, a UC attack error and a Cabral-Wilder rejection all contributed to the scoring for State. State took the lead coming out of the timeout with a Baby Moleni kill and a UC attack error, 25-24. An attack from UC's Shepherd seemed to go out of bounds and the WVSU faithful started to celebrate, but a block touch was called, tempering the mood and tying the match back up. Shepherd picked up another kill and a Cabral attack attempt went long to force the deciding set.

WVSU came out determined in the final set racing out to an 8-4 lead, forcing a UC timeout. Cabral added another point to make it 9-4, but UC refused to go down, firing off a 4-0 run to come within a point, but State scored six of the final seven points capped off by a UC attack then went too far, finally setting off the celebration that began a set earlier.

WVSU will prepare for the Mountain East Tournament which will be hosted inside the Walker Convocation Center next week on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. WVSU is scheduled to play the No. 4 seed from the North Division on Thursday at 5:00 pm. Final seeding will be announced by the Mountain East after Friday's slate of games.
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