CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas - In its 2022 home finale, the Texas A&M-Corpus Christi volleyball team moved into first-place in the Southland standings after earning the favor of a 3-2 edge over McNeese Thursday night at the Dugan Wellness Center.
With their second victory of the week, the Islanders (11-18, 11-4) slid back into the running for a regular season championship with three matches remaining in the conference-slate. They outhit McNeese (15-14, 11-4) .247 to .242 and silenced the Cowgirls to a .000 hitting percentage in the deciding fifth set to split the season series 1-1, both of which went to five sets.
The thrilling five-setter never featured a lead greater than six points as it was a back-and-forth affair from start to finish. Sophomore
Leah Stolfus helped propel the Islanders to the victory after turning in her career-high 23 kills for a .360 mark. Sophomore
Kyndal Payne followed her with 22 kills of her own along with 11 digs for her 12th double-double of the season. Senior
Faith Panhans proved vital by registering her season-high 60 assists along with eight digs, five kills and a service ace.
Junior
Ella Litterell led the match in service aces with four total. Freshman
Zoria Heard was not far behind with three aces while also tallying 11 digs. Senior
Carissa Barnes led the match in digs with 24, continuing her streak of being the digs-leader in every conference match this season.
"That was such a competitive environment and an awesome match by both teams," said head coach
Steve Greene. "McNeese does such a nice job in so many facets of the game and really challenged us. I am really proud of the total team effort and important points that we needed mostly went our way due to our level of effort and focus.
"Leah and Kyndal took a big load of our attacking and handled the pressure that comes with that so well. Faith really turned things around in sets four and five to lead the team and made some incredible plays to propel us to a victory tonight."
With 19 ties and nine lead changes, set one was a fight the whole way as neither team took a lead greater than two points. A 12-11 lead came for the Islanders after the defense forced a pair of McNeese errors but the Cowgirls responded and remained ahead to even reach set point up 24-22. Not backing down, A&M-Corpus Christi fought off set point three times and a trio of kills by Payne, Panhans and Litterell gave the Islanders the 27-25 comeback win.
Sets two and three both had McNeese jump out to leads that were never reversed to help the Cowgirls not only even the match, but take a 2-1 lead heading to the fourth.
The Cowgirls opened the fourth set with a 8-6 lead before a pair of kills by Stolfus fueled an 8-2 run by the Islanders to take a 14-10 lead. McNeese managed to reverse the score once more at the 19-18 mark, but another big run by the Islanders and a crucial solo block by Payne ended the set 25-21 in favor of A&M-Corpus Christi to force a fifth.
Three consecutive kills by sophomore
Morgan Baese gave the Islanders a 8-5 advantage in the first-to-15 fifth set. A kill by freshman
Tayah Little put the Islanders up 13-10 and despite McNeese threatening within one, kills by Little and Baese closed out the 15-12 final score that ended A&M-Corpus Christi's way for the 3-2 match victory.
This was the final home match of the 2022 season. The Islanders were 7-1 at home against Southland opponents and six of those wins were 3-0 sweeps.
"We want to extend a big 'thank you' to the Islander Pep Band and the DeepEnd for making [Dugan Wellness Center] such a great home court advantage," said Greene.
A&M-Corpus Christi's win over the Cowgirls created a three-way tie at the top, with HCU (19-9, 11-4) also in the mix. There will be some separation come Saturday as the Islanders and the Huskies will go head-to-head in Houston to divide the standings. The match is set for 1 p.m. and will be available to watch on ESPN+.
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