Box Score Box Score | Final Stats
LOGAN, Utah - After falling in the first two sets, Idaho State rallied back for a five set victory (21-25, 17-25, 26-24, 25-18, 15-12) over Utah State in the first match of the Utah State Invitational Thursday night. Junior
Breanne Van Every and redshirt freshman
Danielle Downs captured their first career double-doubles and the first of the season for Idaho State.
Van Every posted a match-high 17 kills and notched 10 digs while Downs was right on her heels with 16 kills and 10 digs. Senior middle blocker
Vanessa Muir also recorded double-figures in kills with 13 on the night.
The Bengals struggled to find their offensive rhythm in the first two sets recording a .000 attack percentage in both. However, ISU turned around their play late in the third after a timeout when the Bengals were down 19-15. Idaho State rallied back to win the next four points to tie the set. ISU exchanged points and even held one set point before the Bengals closed out the set 26-24.
In the fourth set, the Bengals and Aggies remained close until the teams were tied and nine and ISU was able to pull ahead on three straight errors from Utah State that forced the Aggies to regain compsure with a timeout. Idaho State won six of the next nine points forcing the Aggies to take another timeout. ISU continued to hold the lead capturing the fourth set soundly, 25-18 to send the contest into a tiebreaker. ISU posted a .205 attack percentage in the fourth set while holding USU to a .138 percentage.
The Aggies knew they needed to get on the scoreboard early if they were going to pull out the fifth set and won three of the first four points. Once again, Idaho State rallied, digging even further into their personal reserves to win the next four points to hold a 4-3 lead. The set remained tight until Downs and setter Lori Mendenhall finished off the Aggies with kills to take the tiebreaker 15-12. The Bengals posted 14 kills with only four errors from 32 attacks in the fifth set for a .312 attack percentage, their best effort of the match.
"We put in Lori and we moved Breanne to the right side and those things helped, but I also think they chose to work harder. They chose to compete," said Teichert about what clicked for the Bengals in the last three sets. "Also they got the middle involved more later in the match.
Vanessa Muir turned in a pretty good overall match and Kylee Searle overall did a good job too."
Mendenhall, a sophomore, led the Bengals with 31 assists while senior setter
Karissa Legaux chipped in 15. Defensively, the Bengals had four players in double-figure digs led by redshirt freshman Kylee Searle with 24 digs. Sophomore
Katie Grajewski notched 11 digs for ISU.
Idaho State improved to 2-3 while Utah State fell to 1-3 for the season.
"To come back from being down to beat Utah State who's a pretty good team. Their coach has been part of two national championships and they beat Hawai'i last year to go to the NCAA tournament so it's a real good win for us," said Teichert. "I hate the way we played in games one and two but to come back from that is a big deal."
The last time the Bengals defeat Utah State was a 3-1 decision in 2006. Idaho State continues the tournament on Friday, Sept. 2 at 5 p.m. against Texas State at the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum.
"We Are Your Bengals"
