Aggies fell short in the deciding fifth set against nationally ranked University of Utah in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum (25-23, 14-25, 20-25, 25-21,15-10)

“It’s a game of ebbs and flows and you have to manage them to win,” head coach Grayson DuBose said after Tuesday’s loss. “Utah has a great team I thought we played well, and our fans were great. Unfortunately we just didn’t manage the ebbs well enough to win.”

Freshman outside hitter Josselyn White from Smithfield, Utah, had her first career start for USU and posted a career-high 10 kills. Her sophomore counterpart Liz McArthur of St. George, Utah, posted a team-high 15 kills for the night.

The two outside hitters put up four kills each in the first set helping the Ags to a two point win, 25-23. USU held the Utes to a .212 hitting percentage while they put up a match high .273. The Aggies out blocked the Utes 4.5 to 1.

Utah commanded the second set holding the Aggies to a dismal -.091 hitting percentage while posting a .235 themselves. The Ute defense took charge early in the second set allowing only four kills and blocking six Aggie attempts. After a back and forth start Utah began to pull away at a score of 9-5. Utah State’s opposite side hitter Emily Kortsen brought the Aggies back within contention with a service ace to bring the score to 12-10, after which, the Utes pulled away. Despite being down 11 points, 24-13, USU didn’t give up and held off the inevitable for at least a point until opposite side hitter Karolina Bartkowiak of Utah smashed a kill shot past the Aggie defense, giving the Utes a 25-14 set win.

Coming out from the break Utah started the third set serving and jumped out to a 2-0 lead. USU soon fought back to tie the set at 3-3. Shantell Durrant soon helped stretch the lead to 6-3 with a blocked kill, which led to the first Ute time-out of the set. The time out didn’t seem to kill USU’s momentum, who came out of the huddle attacking at different outlets with kills coming out of the center and dump sets dropping behind the unsuspecting front line. The lead was 13-7 before Utah swung the momentum, going on a 7-1 run and tieing the set at 14 a piece. Utah took the first lead of the set at 15-14 and never gave it back beating USU 25-20 to take a two sets to one lead.

The fourth set began with a 5-0 USU run but ended up being a hard fought battle of digs and aces. USU had four service aces to Utah’s zero and 17 digs to Utah’s 12. The Ags held on to win the set 25-21, forcing the second tie-break set in as many matches.

The deciding set was a back and forth fight with seven ties (1-1, 2-2, 4-4, 5-5, 6-6, 7-7 and 8-8) and four lead changes (1-0, 1-2, 4-5, and 8-7). After Utah tied up the score at 8-8 it turned to the Ute’s match to lose, they held the Aggies to a .069 hitting percentage while posting a match high .296 percentage, while blocking four USU kills and allowing zero of their kills to be blocked. Utah went on to win the fifth set 15-10 and taking the match three sets to two.

Junior libero Christine Morrill recorded one service ace as well as 28 digs on the night, one dig shy of her career-high.

Utah finished the match with a .237 (62-24-160) hitting percentage compared to USU’s .126 (53-31-175). The Utes also had 2.5 more team blocks (14.0-11.5) and 12 more digs (73-61).

USU hits the court again Wednesday, Sept. 9, at 7 p.m. in the Spectrum to face Idaho State.

c.h.j@aggiemail.usu.edu