The women’s volleyball team played their first conference match of the year versus UT-Permian Basin on Thursday, Sept. 13.
Both teams started off strong and held a close race throughout the entire first game. A serving ace by Ladys Montano tied the game at 25. However, mental lapses on behalf of the TAMIU team allowed UTPB to win the first game 27-30.
The Lady Dustdevils started off the second game with a kill by Montano and never looked back. Their performance led to a 30-22 win in game two of the match.
TAMIU’s momentum was carried on to game three where they defeated UTPB 30-27. The girls led two games to one going into game four; however, UTPB’s hope wasn’t crushed yet, and they proved it in the next two games.
UTPB came back and won game four and five (25-30, 7-15) to win the match.
Wendy McManus, the women’s volleyball team’s head coach, said, “Overall, we did well, but we need to eliminate times when we get down. Also, any time you have four new starters it takes a while to mesh, but we’re working on it everyday, and we’ll do much better once we master it.”
TAMIU was led by Montano with 20 kills and 16 digs.
After being congratulate for a strong performance, she said, “Thank you, but volleyball is a team sport, and my individual performance doesn’t matter or satisfy me if we don’t come up with a win.”
Alexandria Montemayor and Brittany Smith also contributed with 16 and 14 kills each. Mary Koch had 55 assists.
TAMIU is now 0-1 in conference play and 0-7 for the year.