CONWAY, Ark.- Louisiana Tech Volleyball defeated Central Arkansas in their final match of the Central Arkansas Invitational on Saturday afternoon (3-1).
Â
LA Tech (5-6) took three sets in a row after dropping the first set to UCA (17-25, 25-20, 25-19, 25-20). Tech improved their record to 3-5 on the year when dropping the first set.
Â
In the first set, UCA took an early lead that the Lady Techsters struggled to catch.
Andrea Spasojevic started her stand-out match with five kills and three digs, along with scoring five LA Tech points.
Â
The second set was nothing shy of easy for the Lady Techsters. The two teams went back-and-forth most of the set until a 4-0 scoring run cause by three back-to-back errors from the Sugar Bears. With a six-point lead, LA Tech's momentum kept on driving keeping them with a strong lead the rest of the set. Spasojevic finished the set with five points, five kills and three digs.
Â
Tied at 1-1, UCA took an early lead in the third, but Techsters' momentum from the second set kicked to hold off the Sugar Bears.
Sydney Jackwin delivered set the team on top for the rest of the set but delivering a kill set by
Ashley Jones. LA Tech was able to take advantage of UCA's errors late in the game to take six-point lead.
Chard'e Vanzandt had three kills and 4.5 points.
Â
In a nail-biting fourth set, the Lady Techsters were able to make a late comeback to finish the final set and a match victory. The Sugar Bears were in the lead majority of the set until
McKenzie Johnson recorded an ace to tie it up 19-19. The Lady Techsters finished the set with a 6-1 running score with two kills and three errors from UCA. Johnson had 11 digs in the last set, giving her a total of 17 for the match.
Â
QUOTABLES
Head Coach- Amber McCray
"I could not be more proud of this team right now. This was a total team effort from everyone on the court to our sideline. We tried a couple kids in positions they haven't played all year and they stepped up big time for us. Charde VanZandt and
Carla Esquer both had a huge match offensively and coming up with several key blocks on critical moments.
Ashley Jones set an amazing match, and
Kalee Cadwell did a great job coming in an intense situation late in game four to close it out for us. Our servers turning it on to stay aggressive and hit the right zones was also a turning point for the match. UCA is a great, well coached program used to winning, and for us to come in here and get them at home in front of a packed house should be a huge confidence boost for our program moving forward."
Â
NOTABLES
• LA Tech defeats UCA 3-1 for the first time in program history.Â
• Andrea Spasojevic recorded her fourth double-double in a row, with 15 kills, 10 digs, giving her five on the season.•  The Lady   Techsters collected 61 digs, the most since 2018.
• McKenizie Johnson is sitting in second in C-USA for service aces and is ranked top-10 in the country.
• Louisiana Tech has won 3 of their last four matches.
• Tech led the Sugar Bear 5-3 in aces, and have outscored their opponents 79-60 on the year.
• LA Tech is undefeated 4-0 when outscoring their opponent in kills.
Â
UP NEXT
The Lady Techsters will be back in action on Friday, Sept. 6 at 10:00 a.m. CT in the Battle for the Boot tournament against Southern in Hammond, LA. Â
Â
SOCIAL MEDIA
For all the latest in LA Tech Volleyball, follow them on Twitter (@LATechVB), Instagram (@LATechVB) and Facebook (LATechVolleyball).
Â