LAS CRUCES, N.M. - No. 2-seed Utah Valley picked up its first-ever WAC Tournament victory with a five-set win over third-seeded CSU Bakersfield in the semifinals on Friday. With the win, the Wolverines advance to the championship match on Saturday.
UVU out-hit CSUB .178 to .155, but was out-blocked 16 to 12.5. The Roadrunners had 13 service errors on the match compared to the seven of the Wolverines.
Kiahna Vernon paced Utah Valley with 14 kills, while Lexi Thompson added 11 and Madison Dennison finished with 10. Setter Sierra Starley had 49 assists, seven digs and four blocks, while libero Nakisha Willden had a match-high 25 digs.
CSU Bakersfield was led by Carol Grasso with 22 kills and 12 digs. Sydney Haynes added 12 kills. Fabiana Andrade finished with 35 assists, while Jocelyn Rodriguez had 16 digs.
CSUB took the back-and-forth first set 25-22 as the Roadrunners out-hit the Wolverines .182 to .138. Grasso and Haynes had four kills apiece.
In the second set, Utah Valley won the highly contested battle by out-hitting the Roadrunners .286 to .200 and out-blocking CSUB 4-2. Vernon finished with five kills on .500 hitting.
The Wolverines won the third set 25-17 and hit .321 on the set while holding CSUB to a .000 hitting percentage. Hinton led UVU with four kills on .571 hitting.
CSUB led by as many as eight in the fourth set, but Utah Valley battled back to make it a one-point set (21-20) before the Roadrunners scored the last four points for the 25-20 win. Grasso had six kills in the set.
The fifth set went back and forth, with neither team leading by more than one point until UVU took a 6-4 lead. The Wolverines led 10-7 when CSUB used its second time out. UVU scored the next three points out of the time out to go up 13-7, but CSUB responded with a 3-0 run to force a Wolverine time out. UVU had match point after a CSUB service error, but the Roadrunners scored two more points to force UVU to use its final time out. Thompson got a kill out of the time out to seal the victory.