VB Falls in Three at Colorado State
FORT COLLINS, Colo. – New Mexico Volleyball battled late through a pair of extra-point sets to open its penultimate regular-season Mountain West match with Colorado State on the road, but fell late in both en route to a straight-sets loss (24-26, 24-26, 18-25) to the Rams.
The Lobos (18-10, 10-7 MW) will conclude conference play with a road matchup at Wyoming (19-9, 8-9 MW), where a win would guarantee them a spot in the conference tournament in Las Vegas on Nov. 22-24. Even if UNM loses, they still can clinch a spot in the tourney following Saturday’s results.
BY THE NUMBERS
Five days after breaking the program record in career kills and points, Kaitlynn Biassou led the Lobos in kills (14) on team-high .321 hitting while adding five digs and block. She’s cracked double-digit kills in five straight matches and 13 of her last 14.
Kali Wolf and Uxue Guereca both served up an ace each, with Wolf finishing with seven kills and Guereca adding four more to go with a team-high 10 digs – her 19th match this season with double-digit digs. Mattison Matthews contributed three kills off the bench.
Melissa Walden produced 21 assists with six digs, with Madeleine Miller adding six more off the bench.
SET ONE – LOBOS 24, RAMS 26
Wolf and Guereca connected on back-to-back kills to tie things up at 5-all early in the opening set, but the Lobos didn’t put together two points in a row again until a 3-0 run that included a kill from Biassou followed by a pair of CSU errors made it 12-13. Wolf supplied her third kill of the set before another CSU error tied things up at 14-all, with UNM finally taking the lead after Biassou’s fourth kill was followed by another Rams error to make it 20-19. The Lobos took a two-point lead after Wolf served up an ace to make it 23-21, but CSU responded by scoring five of the next six to close out the set before UNM could respond.
SET TWO – LOBOS 24, RAMS 26
UNM wasted no time in mounting a response to open the second set, with Guereca starting things off with the Lobos’ second ace of the night and Biassou connecting on her fifth kill for an early 3-1 lead. She kept rolling, coming up with two more kills as the Lobos extended the lead to 12-9, but CSU put together a 7-2 run in response to threaten to put UNM behind two sets – a deficit the Lobos haven’t recovered from this season. Matthews put a stop to the bleeding with a kill and Biassou continued to keep UNM in the match, cracking double-digit kills with her tenth of the night to tie things up at 22-all. But once again, the Rams resisted UNM through extra points even after the Lobos generated back-to-back CSU errors to tie things up at 24-all, connecting on a pair of kills to take set two by the same score as the first.
SET THREE – LOBOS 18, RAMS 25
Set three was just as tight as the first two, with neither team leading by more than two as they battled to an 18-all standstill thanks to nine kills from four different Lobos along with three CSU errors. But CSU strung together seven unanswered points – capped off by back-to-back kills from Naeemah Weathers – for the first time all night to keep things from going to a fourth.
UP NEXT / FOLLOW THE ACTION
Saturday’s match is set for a 5 p.m. start. The match will be broadcast via the MW Network, with live stats available via golobos.com/vbstats — follow @UNMLoboVB on socials for scores, highlights, gameday content and more.