Thunderbirds rally, knock off Grizzlies

Thursday, October 20

Cedar City, Utah

7:00 PM

Montana

4-15, 1-8BSC

Southern Utah

4-17, 2-7BSC

Montana

Southern Utah

10/20/2016 10:44:00 PM | Volleyball

Box Score PDF Box Score

By: Montana Sports Information

Southern Utah came back from a 1-0 deficit and a used a critical rally in the third set to post a 23-25, 25-15, 26-24, 25-19 victory over the Montana volleyball team Thursday night at Cedar City, Utah.

The loss was the seventh straight for Montana (4-15, 1-8 BSC), which dropped into last place in the Big Sky Conference, one match behind the Thunderbirds (4-17, 2-7 BSC), Montana State and Idaho.

Montana pounded out 15 more kills than Southern Utah, but 38 attack errors led to a .110 hitting percentage for the Grizzlies, and that was too much to overcome.

"We got ourselves into a little bit of trouble attacking. There were some unforced errors on our part that we weren't able to recover from," said coach Brian Doyon, whose team also had nine service errors and got aced seven times.

"We knew it was going to be a serving and passing battle with these guys, and we didn't come out ahead on that side either. That made it tough. It put a lot of pressure on our ability to score."

Montana was trying to open the back half of its Big Sky Conference schedule with a win, and the Grizzlies got off to a good start. They broke away from an 18-18 deadlock in the opening set and held on for a 25-23 win.

The Thunderbirds used an 11-1 run midway through the second set to even the match at 1-1 with a 25-15 win.

Everything about the match changed at the end of set three. The Grizzlies led for much of the set and built leads of 19-13, 23-17 and 24-21 but couldn't shut the door on the Thunderbirds.

Southern Utah used a kill and a Montana attack error to pull within 24-23, then Rylee Rogers served up back-to-back aces to give SUU its first lead since being up 3-2. The Thunderbirds blocked Alexis Urbach to finish off the match-turning comeback.

"We had a good lead and were doing really good things. We just couldn't side out," said Doyon. "That took a lot of wind out of our sails and gave them the momentum."

Montana fell behind 9-3 in set four and never recovered. The Grizzlies pulled within 18-15 on a Sadie Ahearn service ace, but three straight SUU points ended any chance of a comeback.

"We started off a little sluggish in the fourth set. We didn't quite get our feet under us until later in the set," said Doyon.

"I thought we did a really nice job of coming out and playing with intensity right from the start tonight, but they had answers for us, and we weren't able to get that side out or big swing in key situations."

Urbach had a match-high 17 kills, two off her season high, but those were partly offset by a season-high nine attack errors. Southern Utah finished with a 13-6 advantage in blocks.

Missy Huddleston had 11 kills, her third time in four matches with 10 or more, and Ashley Watkins returned to hitting on the right side, in addition to setting half the match. She finished with a season-high 10 kills on .320 hitting, 21 assists and seven digs.

"We put Ashley back in on the right side, and she sided out well for us," said Doyon. "It was a really nice job offensively by her tonight."

Sadie Ahearn finished with 20 digs, two off her career high. She has recorded 20 or more digs in three of Montana's last five matches.

Montana will play at Northern Arizona (18-4, 8-1 BSC) at 1 p.m. (MT) in Flagstaff on Saturday. The Lumberjacks were 3-0 winners over Montana State Thursday night.