Nov. 15, 2015
LOGAN, Utah - San Diego State concluded its weekend road trip with a five-set Mountain West victory at Utah State Saturday evening at the Aggies' Wayne Estes Center. The win completed a series sweep of USU for the Aztecs after having defeated the Aggies in San Diego in mid-October.
With the victory San Diego State improved to 10-19 on the year and 7-9 in the Mountain West. Utah State, meanwhile saw its record fall to 6-23 (2-13 MW).
Baylee Little led SDSU with 16 kills, three blocks, four digs and a .375 hitting percentage. She was joined in double figures in kills by teammates Deja Harris (12) and Alexis Cage (10).
Harris had a career-best nine block assists and two digs while Cage recorded her second double-double of the season as she added 14 digs to her final stat line along with an assist and a block.
Freshman Alexandra Psoma ended the night with eight kills and registered a career-high five blocks along with two assists, two service aces and a pair of digs.
Setter Hailey Jones and Lauren Utchen contributes 30 and 22 assists receptively while libero Devyn Pritchard finished with 13 digs, one more than fellow Aztec Danielle Bolden.
The opening set proved to belong to the home side as the Aggies jumped out to a 10-4 lead and were never threatened. They slowly built on that advantage en route to the 11-point victory as the Aztecs managed only nine kills in the contest.
In the second set it was San Diego State that controlled the tempo as it built an 11-9 lead into a 19-10 score line. Emma Fuzie and Little led the Aztecs with five kills apiece as the team hit .333, its best attack mark in a set during the match.
After the break, the teams came out and played a back-and-forth set that saw seven lead changes and the score tied on nine occasions. With the score knotted at 22-2 late in the game, the Aztecs got a kill form Jones followed by a pair from Little to secure the set victory and go up 2-1 in the match. Harris had five kills to lead SDSU to the win.
Although Utah State led for a majority of the time in the fourth set, the contest was again tied late at 21-21. The teams alternated the next eight points, and with the contest even at 25-25 the Aggies used a kill and Aztec attack error to notch the two-point set win and send the match to a deciding fifth game. Little's five kills and .625 hitting mark in the set led all players, but the Aztecs came up just short despite recording more kills (14-12) than Utah State.
The fifth set continued the trend of the third and fourth as it featured nine tie scores and five lead changes. The Aggies enjoyed the biggest lead of the contest at four points (9-5), but SDSU worked its way back into the contest eventually tying it up at 13-13. The Aztecs had the first match-point opportunity with a 14-13 lead, but could not close it out. Utah State had its only opportunity to win it when it led 17-16, but they, too, couldn't get the winning point. Finally with the scoreboard reading 19-19, San Diego State got back-to-back kills by Psoma to close out the set and match.
Up next for the Aztecs will be their third consecutive road contest as they will travel to northern California next weekend to face San Jose State on Saturday, Nov. 21, at 1:00 p.m. in Spartan Gym.