South Carolina Avoids Upset With Five-Set Win Over Mississippi State

COLUMBIA, S.C. – South Carolina volleyball was able to withstand a fierce comeback effort to hold off Mississippi State (2-8) in five sets Friday night. The Gamecocks gave up a 2-0 set lead and trailed early in set five, but ran off six unanswered points to secure their fifth-consecutive SEC win and moved to 9-3 for the year. Kyla Manning’s 17 kills led the team, with three more of her teammates also reaching double-digit kills.
 
SET ONE: South Carolina looked to be chugging along as usual after hitting .400 in the match the night before, holding Mississippi State to just eight kills in a 25-16 win to open the match. Kyla Manning accounted for five kills to go with four digs and Mikayla Robinson put away three kills on just four swings.
 
SET TWO: The second set would be perhaps the most explosive of the night aside from the dramatic finale. The two teams each hit over .300 and combined for a whopping 37 kills in a 27-25 shootout, with the Gamecocks needing a familiar face in an unfamiliar place to close out the win. The set featured 16 ties and five lead changes, but the Bulldogs used a key block late to push out to a 22-20 lead and held the first set point at 24-23. 
 
After a Manning kill denied the visitors, they would press again with set point at 25-24. Robinson this time would deny them with a kill, and then took the ball back to serve. It was the senior’s first two service attempts in her Carolina career, a span of 104 matches, but she would come through in a clutch – albeit uncomfortable – spot. The Bulldogs committed an unforced attack error to give the Gamecocks their first set point opportunity, and a Manning kill secured the comeback.
 
SET THREE: Seeing it’s opportunity slip away in the second set, Mississippi State pushed back and earned a 25-18 win to extend the match. South Carolina committed five unforced attack errors in the set and hit just .156 as a team, keeping it from mounting a comeback after the Bulldogs jumped out to a 5-1 lead to begin the set. McKenzie Moorman and Riley Whitesides shined on offense, combining for seven kills on 10 attacks, but the rest of the offense had just four kills with four errors on 22 swings.
 
SET FOUR: Mississippi State’s net defense kept the momentum flowing to the visitor’s side of the court in the fourth, as the Bulldogs had a match-high five total blocks and cruised to a 25-20 win. State also played clean on offense, out-hitting the Gamecocks .312 to .147. Freshmen duo Kiune Fletcher and Ellie Ruprich combined for seven kills to lead the team, but an early Bulldog lead would not be relinquished and the match went to five.
 
SET FIVE: With their energy sapped by Mississippi State’s block in set four, the Gamecocks saw a slow start give way to a quick 7-4 deficit in the final game to 15 points. South Carolina was able to shore up its errors that plagued it in the middle sets and got big swings from Kyla Manning to power a comeback. The senior had three of her four kills in the set come after the Gamecocks were able to tie the set back up at 8-8, and the Bulldogs hurt themselves with mental errors late. South Carolina finished on a 6-0 run to secure a 15-9 decision and the win. 
 
NOTABLE

• This is now back-to-back seasons with a five-game winning streak in SEC play. The team hadn’t had a streak that long prior to that since 2002.
• With the win, South Carolina is now 14-3 in five-set matches under head coach Tom Mendoza.
• Mississippi State was able to find success when shutting down Robinson and Manning. In the three sets won, the duo combined for 21 kills. In the three sets lost, that number plummeted to six.
• South Carolina blocked just five balls for the night, the second-lowest total of the season behind only its three-set loss to No. 4 Florida on Nov. 11.
• Ellie Ruprich made her case for SEC Freshman of the Week after combining for 20 kills on just 34 swings and two total errors in the eight sets against the Bulldogs.
• Just to show how efficient South Carolina’s offense was on Thursday compared to Friday, Mallory Dixon had 49 assists in five sets Friday compared to 48 over three sets on Thursday.
• Camilla Covas set a personal best with five aces in the match. The sophomore also added 15 digs. Freshman Caitlin Crawford also pitched in a pair of aces off the bench for Carolina. 

QUOTABLE
Head Coach Tom Mendoza on the message to the team after falling behind early in the fifth set
“Just try to focus on contact by contact and don’t look at the scoreboard, don’t create a narrative of how the night is going. Just move your feet, get your feet to the ball, put a good contact on the ball and put your teammates in a good situation and I think when we started really focusing on some really small process-oriented contacts things started getting easier for us… Once we finally started making some of those adjustments in set five we were putting our teammates in a little bit better situation. That was hopefully a big learning experience for all of our players.”
 
UP NEXT
The Gamecocks wrap up a stretch of four home games in a week’s span when it welcomes in Texas A&M Feb. 10 and 11. The Aggies have yet to play a spring game; their first series against Auburn was cancelled after the Tigers opted out of spring play, and COVID testing protocols forced them to postponed their home weekend against Tennessee Feb. 5-6. Texas A&M went 4-4 in the fall season, starting 4-0 before ending the schedule on a four-game losing streak. Both games between Carolina and A&M will start at 7 p.m.