UTRGV knocks off New Mexico State in WAC opener

UTRGV passed its first test as reigning tournament champion against the team voted to finish first in the Western Athletic Conference when it took down New Mexico State University in a thriller 3-2 (25-23, 20-25, 20-25, 25-23, 15-12) Saturday in the UTRGV Fieldhouse.

Head Coach Todd Lowery said he was glad the team started conference with a win over one of the top volleyball programs in the nation and WAC favorite.

“We’re pretty good here at home,” Lowery said. “That’s a very good team that we beat and statistically it was pretty much a coin toss. It’s a good start to the WAC season, to start with them and a 1-0 start.”

Three players posted double-doubles as junior Ragni Steen Knudsen, senior Bojana Mitrovic and freshman Debora Nazario spearheaded UTRGV’s come-from-behind effort against the Aggies. 

The comeback began in the fourth set down the 21-16 mark when Mitrovic and Knudsen sparked the effort with kills, leading to a 23-23 tie. Freshman Veronika Jandova and sophomore Barbara Silva combined for a block to go up 24-23, allowing UTRGV to win 25-23 on a NMSU attack error to even the match at 2-2.

“We talked about it all week long, being comfortable uncomfortable,” Lowery said. “When we took that last timeout in set four, I said if we’re going to lose, we’re going to lose with doing things we’re uncomfortable with, we’re going to move hitters around, we’re going to make big time adjustments … and I feel we did that.”

In the fifth and final set, UTRGV jumped out to a 4-1 lead, but quickly found themselves down 12-10 on the play of NMSU’s Jordan Abalos. Then, Lowery’s group mounted a comeback in the form of a 5-0 run, scoring the game-winning point on a block by Knudsen and Jandova.

Knudsen said she didn’t feel disrespected NMSU was voted to finish as the conference champion, but she saw it as a challenge.

“For me, it brought a lot of feelings from the WAC [tournament] championship,” she said. “We never gave up and we never wanted to give up. We just kept fighting, because we wanted to win so bad.”

Both Knudsen and Mitrovic recorded their fourth double-doubles on the season as the junior matched her season high with 17 kills and 12 digs and the senior with 16 kills and 12 digs. Nazario had her second double-double of the season with 38 assists and a career high in digs and blocks, finishing with 18 and three.

UTRGV is now 7-7 overall and 1-0 in WAC play. The team is back in action 7 p.m. Thursday in the UTRGV Fieldhouse against the University of Missouri-Kansas City.