Bulldogs Fall in Three to Tide on Friday

Friday, November 16

Starkville

7:00 PM

Mississippi State

5-23 (1-14SEC)

Alabama

19-10 (6-9SEC)

Team	1	2	3	Final F
Alabama	25	25	25	3
Mississippi State	19	21	20	0

Bulldogs win the battle at the net against the Tide with 11.0 to 7.0 total blocks.

Bulldogs Fall in Three to Tide on Friday

November 16, 2018 | Volleyball

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by Mary Catherine Molay, Graduate Assistant/Communications

STARKVILLE- After a valiant effort, Mississippi State (5-23, 1-14 SEC) fell to Alabama (19-10, 6-9 SEC) in three on Friday (Nov. 16) in Newell-Grissom Building.

The Bulldogs fell to the Crimson Tide in three, 25-19, 25-21, 25-20.

"Tonight was an emotional night for us, we played with a lot of good effort," head coach Julie Darty said. "For a good chunk of the game, I thought that our middles were pretty great. Deja dug herself into a hole early, but she did a really good job of coming out of it and coming back. Across the board, I thought our block was really good. There is a lot of things that we have to continue to work on, but the work is there. I am not worried about them working hard or committing to the process, they are totally bought in. They want to get better; they want to win. They did put a lot of heart out there tonight for those seniors. I can't thank those three seniors enough for everything that they have given in this program. We are excited to play Sunday and the last home match of 2018. We are just going to give it our best effort Sunday. Then we get to go on the road and spend Thanksgiving together as a team."

Alabama took the early 10-2 lead with five of the points coming off of Mississippi State errors. From there, Mississippi State struggled to control Alabama's attack game. The Bulldogs were able to rally off of five errors by the Crimson Tide accompanied by kills from Paige Shaw, Amarrah Cooks and Gabby Waden to get back into the set at 18-12, Alabama. The rally was not enough as the Crimson Tide took the set on a kill. Waden had three kills with Shaw and Robinson both tallying two. Gabby Zgunda had seven digs. Mississippi State led in blocks with 4.0 to Alabama's 3.0.

The second set had more momentum than the first as Alabama went on a four-point streak to lead 5-1 before MSU countered with six-straight points to pull ahead 7-5. The score was back-and-forth going forward as there were nine ties and four lead changes. While trailing 18-17, back-to-back kills by Khristian Carr put MSU ahead before Alabama countered with five-straight points to lead 23-19. A service error secured the set for the Crimson Tide. Cooks tallied three kills while Carr, Shaw and Waden had two. Morgan Kath and Alleah Stamatis both had one service ace.

In another close set, both teams were neck-and-neck as errors and kills once again told the story. While trailing 14-9, MSU countered with three-straight kills from Cooks, Kath and Shaw to put the score within two. Alabama began to pick up momentum, which forced Darty to call a timeout to rally her squad. The rally was not enough as the Crimson Tide took the set, 25-20, to win the match. Shaw accumulated five kills and four digs. Cooks had four blocks with three of them coming from solo blocks.

Mississippi State's last home match is on Sunday against Texas A&M. First serve is set for 1 p.m. on the SEC Network.

Dawg Bites from Friday

Robinson tallied three total blocks. That puts her in 5th place for most total blocks as a freshman with 80. She is one block away from equaling Nicole Palazzo (2005) with 92.
Shaw led the team with nine kills. She also had 10 digs and three blocks.
Cooks and Waden both had six kills
Zgunda tallied 20 digs
Mississippi State won the battle at the net tallying 11.0 total blocks in comparison to Alabama's 7.0.

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