San Antonio – St. Mary’s had yet to trail in a match this season. But the Lady Rattlers’ volleyball team showed Saturday it can certainly handle a deficit when facing one.

St. Mary’s stormed back from an early one-set hole to beat the TexAnns 3-2 in the final match of the St. Mary’s Volleyball Tournament at Bill Greehey Arena.

The Rattlers joined Regis as the only teams to go unbeaten in the event, as both teams went 4-0 in the tournament.
Tarleton State and Abilene Christian finished 3-1, while East Central, Illinois-Springfield and Pace all went winless.

Most impressively for the Rattlers, their 5-0 start to the season marks their best start since 1996, when they began the year 9-0.

RE-WATCH THE END OF THE MATCH

Still, it took overcoming an early hole to get there.

“Their pace is really intense,” said Kirsten Chapman (Sr., Jourdanton, Texas) of Tarleton State. “As soon as the whistle is blown, they serve. It kind of threw us off at first.

“It’s been a long week for us. We just came into that second game and told ourselves we needed to stick together as a team.”

St. Mary’s placed two players – Stephanie Proske (Sr., La Grange, Texas) and Allie Murray (Jr., San Antonio) – on the All-Tournament Team.

Proske led all players who played a double-digit amount of sets with a .351 hitting percentage, while Murray led everyone in assists with 164 (9.65 per set).

Regis’ Makayla Higgins, who stuffed the stats sheet in hitting percentage, assists and service aces, was named the Tournament Most Valuable Player.

Rounding out the All-Tournament Team were Tarleton State’s Nikki McNorton (.351 hitting percentage), Abilene Christian’s Jennie Hutt (3.54 kills per set), East Central’s Megan Kimak (90 digs) and Regis’ Sage Martinson (10.33 digs per set).

Prior to knocking off Tarleton State (18-25, 25-15, 25-21, 19-25, 15-11), St. Mary’s swept Illinois-Springfield 25-12, 25-10, 25-20 in their cleanest performance of the tournament.

Freshman defensive specialist had 21 digs against Tarleton State, while Murray recorded 43 assists. Adrianna Keys (Sr., San Antonio), Chapman and Mallory Moeller (Geronimo, Texas) each had posted kills.

St. Mary’s will return to action next Friday, when they travel to Springfield, Mass., for the American International Tournament.

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