(St. Louis, Mo.) – The Missouri S&T Miner volleyball dropped a hard fought four set match 3-1 (21-25, 25-16, 22-25, 22-25) on Friday evening at the Mark Twain Building in St. Louis, Mo. Alison Mueller (Bartelso, Ill./Mater Dei ) led three Miners (8-7, 5-3 GLVC) in double figures with 16 kills.

The match was tightly contested throughout with 27 ties and 11 lead changes, but S&T couldn't take advantage of some its opportunities in the first and third sets to try and steal a road victory.

The opening set was the tightest of the four with 16 ties and five lead changes alone. Through the first 40 points of the frame the largest lead for either side was two points and that was for the Miners on two different occasions.

S&T held a 20-19 edge only to see the Tritons (8-5, 5-3 GLVC) score three straight points to grab a 22-20 lead and forced the Miners to call timeout. Out of the break S&T got a kill from Krista Haslag (Linn, Mo./Helias ) to pull within 22-21, but three straight kills by Allie Ewing gave the set to UMSL 25-21.

The second set belonged to the Miners as they raced out to an early 10-point advantage. The Tritons would cut the deficit to six at 21-15 before S&T closed it out scoring four of the final five points to even the match at a set apiece.

In the pivotal third set the Miners held a three-point lead at 17-14 only to see UMSL score four of the next five points to even it at 18-18 apiece. S&T would regain the lead at 20-19 but just like the opening set were unable to finish as the Tritons scored six of the last eight points to win 25-22 and take the 2-1 lead.

In the fourth stanza UMSL held a 19-13 lead and appeared to have the match in hand, but the Miners refused to quit climbing back into the set led by three kills from Gracey Moon (Kirkwood, Mo./Kirkwood) to get within 20-19. That would be the closest they got though as the Tritons were able to hold S&T at bay finishing with a 5-3 run to take the set 25-22 and win the match.

The Miners outhit UMSL .247 percent-to-.223 percent, but the Tritons recorded 61 kills to 58 for S&T.

Mueller led all players with her 16 kills while Moon had 14 and Haslag added 12. Allie Plunk (Hurst, Texas/Birdville) dished out 50 assists and Emily Jaeger (St. Louis, Mo./St. Joseph's Academy) had 30 digs.

Jory Siebenmorgen led UMSL with 15 kills while Ewing and Carly Ochs added 12 and 11 kills respectively. Lindsay Meyer had 27 assists and Emily Bragaw finished with 18 digs.

The Miners are back in action on Saturday afternoon when they take on Maryville University beginning at 3 p.m.