By Wes Bloomquist  ||  wes.bloomquist@angelo.edu

SAN ANGELO – A win over No. 24-ranked West Texas A&M was there to be had with a 2-0 lead, but the Angelo State volleyball team couldn't finish it off as the Lady Buffs escaped the Junell Center with a five-set win over the Belles on Friday.

The Belles (17-6, 9-5 LSC) jumped out to a two-set lead before WT (26-3, 13-0 LSC) staged its rally to extend its winning streak to 18 matches and claim at least a share of the conference championship. ASU finished the match with a 72-62 kill advantage and limited the Lady Buffs to a .153 attacking percentage.

"I felt like we were transitioning really well in the first two sets and were giving ourselves a lot of good scoring opportunities," ASU head coach Chuck Waddington said. "We dug a lot of balls throughout the match, but I felt like we started playing tentative after the second set and you can't do that against a team like WT. We were trying to place the ball and that's what they wanted us to do. I'm really proud of our kids for the way they played and the effort they gave. They played hard and did a lot of great things on the court. If you get a team on the ropes like that, you have to step on them and finish it off. We weren't able to do that, but hopefully we'll get better from it."

The Belles, who had a five-match winning streak end with the loss, return to action at 2 p.m. on Saturday against Eastern New Mexico at the Junell Center.

Brianna Sotello led the Belles with a career-high 29 digs and added 13 kills, while Mallory Blauser finished the night with 23 kills and four blocks. Shelby Wilt supplied a season-high 36 digs to pace a team with five-players recording double-digit dig performances with Katie MacLeay matching Sotello with 29 digs along with Brooke Robertson finishing with 13 digs and Alexa Johnson having 12 digs. Johnson established a new career high with 60 assists for the Belles, while Zoey Hanrahan had a career-high seven blocks and added 10 kills.

"We were digging to kill and in serve receive we were giving Alexa good passes to mix up our shots," Wilt said. "That's how we were successful in the first two sets and that's what we needed to do to continue being successful. We are a good team and we know it, but we just have to work out the kinks and finish off matches like this that we should have won."

Daeleigh Castile added eight kills and seven digs for the Belles, while Haley Bianco provided six digs. Castile and Blauser each had four blocks and Abbie Lynn finished the night with 11 kills and two blocks. Johnson, who has recorded new career-highs in assists the past two matches, also added three blocks against the Lady Buffs.

The Belles earned the 25-22 first-set win with Blauser leading the way with eight kills and Johnson at 17 assists and MacLeay providing 12 digs. The Belles led throughout and had a 20-13 advantage with a Hanrahan kill. Blauser finished off the set with back-to-back kills and the Belles took the momentum into the second set where they would once again win 25-22. The second set saw the Belles leading 18-10 on a pair of Lynn kills before WT narrowed the gap at 22-20. Another Blauser kill took the score to 23-20 in ASU's favor before Hanrahan made it 24-21 and then a service error by the Lady Buffs ended the set.

WT would take the third set 25-23 over the Belles and the fourth set 25-21 to force a decisive fifth set. Angelo State started out strong in the fifth set by taking a 4-1 lead with the assistance of three Lady Buff errors to go along with a Hanrahan kill. The Lady Buffs fought back to square the set at 5-5 before a kill by Lynn and a two errors gave ASU a 9-7 advantage. ASU led 10-8 on a Castile kill and 11-9 on a Blauser kill, but WT started chipping away with a Lauren Bevan kill and then took a 12-11 lead over ASU on two Belle errors. Kameryn Hayes and Sydney Harlan finished off the match with back-to-back kills for the Lady Buffs.

Bevan led the Lady Buffs with 25 kills and finished the match with 21 digs and a .224 attacking percentage, while Lauren Britten and Aspen Sanders had 31 digs. WT finished the night with a 13-11 block advantage with Hayes leading the team with six blocks.