Box Score Box Score

DENTON, Texas  The Missouri Western volleyball team played hard but fell 3-1 (25-22, 25-15, 20-25, 25-21) against Arkansas-Fort Smith in their third match of the 2011 Holiday Inn Express & Suites Classic hosted by Texas Women's University. The Griffons fall to 7-7 on the season and will play their final match of the classic at 3:30 pm against Arkansas-Monticello.

The Griffons played the first half of set one very well claiming a 12-10 lead after a Shelby Corkill kill from Stephanie Hattey. The rest of the set would be all Fort Smith outscoring Western 15-9 claiming set one 25-21. Western hit just .023 in the set with 11 kills and 10 errors.

Set two began well once again for the Griffons taking a 10-8 lead early on. From there Fort Smith took control winning 17 of the final 22 points claiming the 25-15 victory and taking a 2-0 lead in the match. Western hit better in the second set making just five errors with 13 kills.

Western came out of the break sluggish getting down 13-5. Western remained calm and regained focus outscoring Fort Smith 20-7 the rest of the set claiming the 25-20 victory. Western hit well again at .273 with 16 kills in the set.

The Griffons hurt themselves in set three with 10 hitting errors despite getting 17 kills. Western led set three by five at 15-10 but errors cost the Griffons as Fort Smith ended the match outscoring Western 8-4 taking the 25-21set victory and the 3-1 victory in the match. Arkansas-Fort Smith improves to 14-5 on the season.

Western had 57 kills with Tahlor Johnston and Alex Behnke leading the way with 22 and 17 respectively. Hattey continued to play well with 44 set assists and 17 digs while Sarah Faubel had 18 of the Griffons 79 digs. Behnke had three of the Griffons six services aces in the match.

Fort Smith had 54 kills with Morgan Banner leading the way with 15. Whitney Hale had 38 set assists while Keely Rivera had 21 of their 72 digs. Fabiane Nass had four of their 10 services aces while they had 10 blocks as a team.  

Missouri Western is an NCAA Division II member of the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association and is located in St. Joseph, Mo.

-MWSU-