University of North Texas
8-12,5-4AAC
South Florida
12-8,8-1AAC
Volleyball Rally Falls Short
10/25/2024 10:22:00 PM | Women's Volleyball
DENTON, Texas – Mean Green volleyball dropped a hard-fought, 3-2 loss against South Florida at the UNT Volleyball Center on Friday night.
"We told [the team] coming into this match, we have to be prepared for the fight," head coach Kristee Porter said. "This wasn't going to be a game that was going to be easy. Every point, every game we're going to need to fight for and I thought our team did a really good job of fighting tonight."
After losing the first two sets in narrow fashion, UNT (8-12, 5-4) fought back to claim the third and fourth frames (23-25, 32-34, 25-20, 25-14, 10-15) but were unable to hold off American Athletic Conference leaders South Florida (12-8, 8-1) in the fifth.
For the second time in the past week, the Mean Green posted 17 total blocks to tie for the fifth-best mark in the 25-point rally scoring era, which began in 2008.
Freshman Ryann Vik registered 13 blocks to set a new career high and mark the third-most in the 25-point rally scoring era history. She is the first UNT player to record double-digit blocks in multiple matches of a single season since Courtney Windham (2011-13) did so in 2013.
Coco Gillett led the team with 18 points including a career high seven blocks while she added 13 kills and 11 digs for her fourth double-double of the season. She enters Sunday's match three kills shy of 1,000 for her collegiate career.
Aryn Johnson claimed the team lead in kills as she finished 16-for-35 for her third-best total of the season, with a .314 hitting percentage.
UP NEXT
UNT will travel to Avron B. Fogelman Arena in the Devlin Fieldhouse for its second meeting of the season against Tulane (12-8, 4-4) on Sunday at 2 p.m. on ESPN+.
