CANYON – Angelo State and Texas Woman's will meet for the third time this season and for the second straight year in the semifinals of the Lone Star Conference Volleyball Championship at 5 p.m. today at the WTAMU Fieldhouse.

The No. 20-ranked Belles (22-8) advanced to the semifinals for the fifth straight season with a four-set win over Midwestern State on Thursday. Texas Woman's (22-9) comes into the semifinal match having won eight of its last nine matches, including a sweep of Texas A&M-Kingsville on Thursday in the quarterfinals of the tournament. TWU earned a 3-0 (25-18, 25-21, 25-17) win in Denton in the first match between the two team before ASU took a 3-1 (25-16, 17-25, 25-20, 25-22) win on Oct. 19 in San Angelo.

ASU earned a five-set win over the Pioneers last season in the semifinals (25-14, 18-25, 25-19, 24-26, 15-11) at the Junell Center and have a 30-13 all-time advantage in the series.

"Texas Woman's is a well-coached team that plays disciplined," ASU head coach Chuck Waddington. "They are really good offensively and put a lot of balls away. They have good middles and a strong left-side attacker. We've got to work hard to get them out of system and make our job a little easier. They have great ball control which makes it tough. I think the team that wins this match today is the one who wins the serve and pass battle. We're going to do our best to do that."

West Texas A&M and Texas A&M-Commerce will meet in the second semifinal match of the day at 7:30 p.m. The winners of the two semifinals will play at 2 p.m. on Saturday in the tournament's championship match.

Maddie Huth enters tonight's match with 347 kills and 110 blocks in her senior season. Huth earned LSC Co-Offensive Player of the Year honors after also securing three-time LSC Offensive Player of the Week selections this season. A reigning all-America selection, Huth has 1,104 kills and 382 blocks in her career. She led the Belles with 15 kills and three solo blocks on Thursday in the win over the Mustangs.  

Setter Maggi Jo Keffury finished the regular season with 1,159 assists and had 49 in the quarterfinal match on Thursday. She also has 292 digs in her first year at Angelo State. A junior who started her collegiate career at New Mexico State, Keffury finished second in the LSC with 11.14 assists per set and was a five-time LSC Setter of the Week. She was named to the LSC first-team at Wednesday night's banquet.

Shelby Wilt is the all-time digs leader in ASU history with 1,766 digs and is a three-time LSC Defensive Player of the Week this season. Wilt, who was named to the LSC second-team, has 532 digs (4.83 per set) in her junior season and has 28 aces. Wilt led ASU with three aces and 15 digs on Thursday in the win over MSU. She also has 108 assists this season and 275 in her career. Kaelen Valdez comes into the semifinal match with 1,521 digs and 992 kills in her four-year career at Angelo State. The senior is currently fourth in program history in digs after finishing with 380 digs in the regular season and now 391 after an 11-dig performance on Thursday. She also has 144 kills this year and needs only eight kills to reach the 1,000 kill milestone.

Arielle Bond currently has 321 kills and was selected to the LSC second-team after also being a two-time LSC Offensive Player of the Week in her sophomore season. Bond had 14 kills and hit .278. Fellow sophomores Haley Bianco and Katie MacLeay have provided steady defense throughout the season with MacLeay at 358 digs and Bianco 314 digs. Redshirt freshman Cerbi Ritchey had 182 kills and 41 blocks, while freshman Courtney Bartusiak has 182 kills and 48 blocks in her first season in San Angelo. Zoey Hanrahan had six kills and led the Belles with a .417 hitting percentage on Thursday.

Belle Single-Match Highs
Blocks: 8 (2- 6) Maddie Huth vs. Southwest Minn. St. (Sep 14, 2013 in Denver, CO)
Attacking Percentage: .667 (13- 1-18) Courtney Bartusiak vs. CSU-Pueblo (Sep 06, 2013)
Kills 3-Set: 16 (16- 3-34) Leah McWilliams vs. Cameron (Sep 21, 2013)
Kills 4-Set: 16 (16-4-33) Maddie Huth vs. A&M-Commerce and West Texas A&M
Kills 5-Set: 24 (24- 5-55) Arielle Bond vs. Midwestern State (Sep 20, 2013)
Assists: 57 (5s) Maggi Jo Keffury vs. A&M-Commerce (Oct. 18, 2013)
Digs: 32 (5s) Shelby Wilt vs. A&M-Commerce (Oct. 18, 2013)
Aces: 5 –  Haley Bianco vs. Eastern New Mexico (Nov. 9, 2013)
 
TEXAS WOMAN'S PIONEERS
Marcela Alves and Chloe' Tate led the Pioneers this season and both middle blockers were honored with LSC first-team recognition. Alves, a senior from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, currently has 280 kills on the season with Tate at 262 kills. Alves is also a strong defensive presence with 147 blocks (1.35 per set) which ranks second in the LSC, while Tate is third in the conference with 125 blocks (1.09 per set).

Josie Santos, a senior outside hitter, and setter Kayla Rivero were second-team all-conference selections. Rivero has 614 assists this season with a 5.74 assist per set average. Morgan Wilson leads TWU with 4.69 digs per set and 539 overall. Jaqueline Santos comes into the semifinal match with 81 blocks.

 
SAN ANGELO – The No. 16-ranked Angelo State volleyball team went on a 7-0 run to close out the fourth set to earn a 3-1 Lone Star Conference win over Texas Woman's and Maddie Huth had 13 kills to surpass 1,000 kills in her career at the Junell Center.

Shelby Wilt led the Belles with 23, while Kaelen Valdez finished off the match with back-to-back kills in the fourth set and finished the day with 21 digs and nine kills. Arielle Bond and Cerbi Ritchey also had 13 kills for the Belles who had a .145 hitting percentage and earned the four-set win despite being outblocked 15-7 in the match.

Maggi Jo Keffury continued to run an efficient offense at the setter position and contributed 54 assists and 17 digs a day after supplying a career-high 57 assists against A&M-Commerce. Haley Bianco added 16 digs with Katie MacLeay had 13 digs to provide 29 digs from the pair of sophomore defensive specialist. Courtney Bartusiak led the team with a .226 hitting percentage and had 11 kills.

Angelo State opened the match with a 25-16 win in the first set by limiting its errors to seven and digging 23 attacks. Bond, Bartusiak and Valdez each had three kills in the set with MacLeay having six digs in the opening set. ASU would struggle in the second set with 12 errors, but would respond by taking the next two sets and the win.

The Belles staved off a fifth set after TWU had established a 22-18 lead in the fourth. Ritchey started the rally with three kills which were alternated between two TWU errors. Valdez would close the door on the Pioneers with two kills.

"All week we were competitive in practice," Valdez said. "We were going hard at each other and I think that carried over into this weekend. We just need to keep doing that and turn this season around."

Josie Santos led TWU with 11 kills, while Chloe' Tate had seven blocks and three kills. Kayla Rivero had 19 assists with Kimberly Bell adding another 17 assists. TWU was limited to a .114 hitting percentage in the match and committed 22 errors.
 

DENTON – The Angelo State volleyball team suffered its first sweep of the season and its second consecutive loss with a 3-0 (25-18, 25-21, 25-17) Lone Star Conference defeat to Texas Woman's on Tuesday at the Kitty Magee Arena.

The No. 10 Belles (11-4, 4-2 LSC) return to action at 5 p.m. against Texas A&M-Commerce at the Lion Field House in Commerce. TWU (12-5, 4-1 LSC) has now taken the last two regular-season meetings against ASU after winning the final match of the 2012 regular season before the Belles eliminated the Pioneers in the semifinals of the conference tournament.  TWU now goes on a six-match road trip which will include a stop in San Angelo for the rematch against the Belles on Oct. 19 at the Junell Center.

Angelo State was limited to a .082 hitting percentage in the loss and committed 23 errors. TWU hit .202 in the match and limited its errors to 16 and had 78 digs in the match to ASU's 67 digs. The Pioneers also held an 11.5-4 blocking advantage in the match and took advantage of six ASU service errors.

Arielle Bond led the Belles with 10 kills with Maddie Huth adding eight kills and two blocks. Maggi Jo Keffury had 23 assists and 11 digs with Katie MacLeay leading the team with 17 digs. Shelby Wilt contributed 10 digs and five assists, while Haley Bianco had 11 digs and Cerbi Ritchy provided six kills.

Mallory Kuechle, Marcela Alves and Jaqueline Santos led TWU with eight kills each, while Morgan Wilson had a match-high 22 digs with Torie Talkington adding 18 digs and five kills.

The Belles fell behind 11-4 in the first set after six straight TWU points off two attacking errors, a service error and kills from Jacqueline Santos, Mallory Keuechel and Marcela Alves. ASU closed to within a 14-9 deficit on an Arielle Bond kill and then closed to 15-12 on a pair of Huth kills. Two consecutive attacking errors took the score back to 17-12 and forced an ASU timeout.  The Belles closed to within four but lost the opening set 25-18. Huth led ASU with five kills in the set, but the Belles were held to a .000 hitting percentage with 12 attacking errors.

ASU responded in the second set by taking a 7-3 advantage on two Courtney Bartusiak kills, one each from Huth and Valdez combined with four TWU errors. The Belles extended their lead to 11-7 on a Bond kill and to 13-10 on a Ritchey kill before TWU went on a rally to tie the match at 15 with the help of three ASU errors. The Pioneers went on a 5-2 run to take a 20-17 advantage on two more ASU errors before closing out the set 25-21 on a kill from Tate.

The third set started with the Belles jumping out to a 5-2 lead on a pair of kills from Leah McWilliams and one each from Ritchey and Bartusiak. TWU would take its first extended leads at 11-7 on back-to-back kills from Tate and Santos. The Pioneers extended its advantage to 17-11 with four straight points before a kill form Valdez that only momentarily slowed the rally.  The set and match ended with TWU on a 5-2 rally which was capped by a Santos kill.

The three-set loss was the first time Angelo State has been swept since losing to Colorado School of Mines last season at the Colorado Premier Challenge on Sept. 8, 2012. It is the first conference sweep since Nov. 6, 2011 against West Texas A&M.