Box Score (Rolla, Mo.) – For the 13^th time this season the Missouri S&T Lady Miners extended a match to five set but unfortunately it fell 3-2 (25-20, 23-25, 21-25, 25-22 and 13-15) to the Missouri-St. Louis Tritons on Tuesday evening in Rolla. S&T has played the most five set matches of any school in D-II this season.

The Lady Miners (9-21, 4-6 GLVC) got off to a great start in the opening set outhitting the Tritons (17-9, 7-2 GLVC) by a .379-to-.128 hitting percentage and took advantage of nine UMSL errors to win 25-20. S&T led by as many as six in the set before Missouri-St. Louis closed within 20-18 but a trio of kills by Kit Spears down the stretch sealed the set for the Lady Miners. Julie Meyer and Spears had seven of S&T's 13 kills in the frame.

The Triton offense awoke in the second set recording 18 kills in 36 chances against only three errors led by Liz Cook and Weslie Gaff with 11 of them. The Lady Miners trailed by as many as four late in the set at 23-19 and got within 24-23 before Sara Eisnaugle won it with a kill. S&T's offense finished the set with 13 kills but committed one more error in the stanza as UMSL finished the frame outhitting them .417-to-.214 to even the match at 1-1 with the 25-23 set win.

The Tritons continued their hot hitting in the third set recording 14 kills and had an attack percentage of .263 while the Lady Miners hit only .111 and had eight attack errors and 12 kills in the back and forth set that featured 13 ties and two lead changes. UMSL broke open a 20-20 tie with four straight points on kills by Cook and Kelsie Rankin and a pair of attack errors by S&T. Meyer kept the set alive with a kill but Cook recorded a kill on the next point for the 25-21 set win and 2-1 advantage.

The Lady Miners rallied from a four point deficit early in the fourth set to eventually tie it at 18 all. They still trailed 20-19 before closing the frame out on a 6-2 run behind the play of Meyer, Erin Bekebrede and Danielle Kracl accounted for all six points in the run to win 25-22 and even the match at 2-2. S&T hit .333 percent in the stanza while limiting the Triton offense to just a 23 percent hitting percentage. The Lady Miners had 15 kills compared to just 14 for UMSL.

In the fifth set S&T held an 8-7 lead and the serve at the changeover. The turning point of the set came on the first play after the changeover when the Tritons got a kill of a ball that should have been dug to tie it at 8-8. The Lady Miners then committed back-to-back attack errors giving UMSL a 10-8 lead. S&T would get it back within one five different times down the stretch but were unable to sustain a run to overtake Missouri-St. Louis as it held on for the 15-13 win. The Tritons hit 24 percent in the final set while the Lady Miners hit just 13 percent.

UMSL finished the contest hitting 25.4 percent (70 kills/26 errors/173 total attacks) and were led by Cook and Gaff with 19 and 18 kills respectively.

S&T hit a little bit lower at 23.3 percent with 11 fewer kills but had five less attack errors in 10 fewer chances. Meyer, Bekebrede and Samantha Klump finished the match with a combined 42 kills. As a team the Lady Miners finished the evening with 13.5 total blocks.

S&T returns to action this Saturday when it travels to Searcy, Ark., to take on Arkansas-Fort Smith and Harding in a triangular match beginning at 3:30 p.m. at Harding University.