Last night, the San Diego State women’s volleyball team’s win over the Rebels at Peterson Gym showcased a fierce battle between the Mountain West rivals.
“There was a lot of conflict through the net with the players,” head coach Brent Hilliard said. “That is something that got my juices boiling because that’s how it used to be done in the olden times, and It was fun to watch.”
Jasmine Davis also recalled the Rebels poking at the team but noted that the team made sure not to let the Rebels steer their focus in the wrong direction.
“We already knew they were that type of team that wanted to rattle us, get us angry and get us frustrated by doing those types of things,” Jasmine Davis said. “That’s who they are and props to them, but we kept our cool.”
Five Aztecs had notable performances throughout the night, including Davis. The graduate student was working on both sides of the court earning nine kills and 16 digs throughout the night.
“She’s just our best overall player,” Hilliard said. “Great passing and great hitting, she’s a steadying force for this team.”
Fellow graduate student Shea Rubright had a career performance shutting down the Rebels with a career-high 11 blocks. The career high does not stop at Rubright as Natalie Hughes also earned a high of seven blocks. The team had a season-high 16 team blocks against the Rebels.
Offensively, Taylor Underwood and Talea Mitchell took the spotlight for the Aztecs. Both players combined for 30 kills with Underwood leading with 16 kills. The freshman, Mitchell, has collected 44 kills in her last three games, including her 24-kill performance against the Rams.
These performances helped seal the win for the Aztecs, but the Rebels did make sure to not make it easy for the Aztecs.
“They started out with good service pressure,” Hilliard said. “They got a lot of players going and that was the challenge for us.”
Late in the first set, SDSU took its first deficit 16-18 after four unanswered points by the Rebels. The Aztecs responded with six unanswered points of their own following a time-out by Hilliard. SDSU closed out the set with two team blocks from Kat Cooper and Underwood 25-19.
Set two mirrored the first as SDSU took the set 25-19, but it was the last 11 points of set three that kept both teams on the edge of their seats. It was during these 11 plays that both teams used all their timeouts with Hilliard being the first after being 17-20.
Both teams exchanged points until the Rebels used their last timeout 22-23. The Rebels began with an attack error, but a kill from Dakota Quinlan and an error by Mitchell gave the UNLV its first victory of the night 23-25.
“I screwed up on some substitutions, and it never got to the point where we were going to be in a bad rotation, but it was close,” Hilliard said. “I didn’t do the best job, but I really appreciated the girls’ fight because they were behind that game.”
SDSU made sure to keep the match to four sets following its first loss of the game. A late five unanswered point run to make it a match point 24-18 by the Aztecs in the fourth set kept the Rebels from forcing the game to overtime. For the third time in the match, the set closed 25-19 after a Rubright kill.
SDSU moves to 6-3 in conference play and an overall record of 14-5. The win also breaks a four-game losing streak with the Rebels. This is the only meeting between the two teams this season.
“This is a great home win, especially with the (road) stretch,” Davis said. “It’s just great to end 3-0 on a big week.”
SDSU will begin a three-game road trip heading first to Boise Idaho to face the Broncos. Following that game, the Aztecs hit a point in the season where the team would face many of the teams they faced early in the season.
“We will see everyone again, and that will be fun,” Hilliard said. “We have some paybacks, and we have some matches where people are looking to get at us too.”
SDSU is set to play the Broncos on the road at 5 p.m. on Oct. 24.
