Rebels’ season ends in NCAA volleyball loss

PROVO, Utah — Nine years had passed since UNLV’s only other appearance in the NCAA volleyball tournament. But the Rebels, even in the throes of suffering a second-round sweep at the hands of Brigham Young on Saturday, sounded like a team determined not to let another such drought occur.

UNLV fell 25-23, 25-21, 25-12 as the Rebels started strong and fought through close first and second sets before eventually succumbing to the 10th-ranked Cougars.

“A lot of teams, their first time in it (the NCAA tourney), are just overwhelmed by it,” said UNLV coach Cindy Fredrick, whose squad beat No. 22 Utah in a first-round match Friday. “Then they get blown out that first round and say, ‘Whoa, we were happy to be here.’

“We were never like that,” she added. “We were happy to be here and we wanted to win.”

Against UNLV (24-8), a team it had swept earlier in the regular season, BYU (29-3) actually stumbled out of the gate and fell behind 9-1 in the opening set.

“We played them in the preseason, so we knew the court, the environment — all those kinds of things,” Rebels’ junior setter Lexi Patterson said. “We knew we needed to come in fired up and ready to go, and I thought we did.”

“I thought we started out just great. The blocking was fantastic and we were answering with good kills,” Fredrick said. “Our block was so on fire in that first set. But all credit to BYU; they just kept coming back.”

But the Cougars, playing in front of an exuberant home crowd at Smith Fieldhouse, inserted junior setter Alohi Robins-Hardy into the lineup and, later in the set, put in sophomore outside Danelle Parady-Stetler for some extra punch.

“We just brought her in to see if we could give them a different look for their block,” BYU coach Heather Olmstead said. “She brought some good energy and I was just super-proud that she stayed focused on her task at hand.”

UNLV, meanwhile, struggled with its own strong-side hitting attack and BYU was able to concentrate defensively on standout right-side hitter Bree Hammels and the Rebels’ middle duo of Elsa Descamps and Ashley Owens.

“I think you’ve got to give BYU a lot of credit for the adjustments they made,” Fredrick said. “They ran away from Bree and their answer was to set the right side and set the middle and they did a really nice job of that.

“You have to give BYU kudos for that,” she added. “Darn it.”

In a 19-19 game in the first set, Parady-Stetler scored kills on two of the next three points — sandwiched around a Rebels’ hitting error — to give the Cougars a three-point lead. UNLV drew within one, at 24-23, before a kill by Roni Jones-Perry gave Brigham Young the opening game.

The second set was also close into the late stages as BYU pulled away from a 20-19 advantage. Two kills by Amy Boswell and one by Parady-Stetler pushed the Cougars to set point — which was converted on another kill by Parady-Stetler.

Roni Jones-Perry led BYU with 17 kills while Amy Boswell added 14. Lacy Haddock added nine, Whitney Howard scored eight and Parady-Stetler contributed with seven kills off the bench.

UNLV was led by Hammel’s 12 putaways. But the Rebels’ next biggest contributer was Caitlin Wernentin, who had five kills.

In contrast to the first two sets, the third was never in doubt as the Cougars reeled off a 6-1 spurt to start that game and never looked back.

“It was a good opportunity for us to play them earlier in the season,” Olmstead said. “I followed their season closely and they have a fantastic team. Cindy’s done a great job for them.”