CANYON – Angelo State finished as the Lone Star Conference Volleyball Championship runner-ups for the fifth straight season after Tarleton State rallied to take a five-set thriller in the finals on Saturday at the WTAMU Fieldhouse.

"Our team played hard tonight," ASU head coach Chuck Waddington said. "Unfortunately, we didn't execute very well when it mattered."

Angelo State (21-8) will now await the NCAA Division II Volleyball Selection show which will announce at-large bids at 9 p.m. on Sunday at NCAA.com. The TexAnns earned the LSC's automatic bid with their first tournament title in program history. ASU, which was ranked No. 8 in the region last week, has earned an at-large bid to the past three regional tournaments and to the past two regional finals.

The Belles held a 2-1 lead after taking the second and third sets from the TexAnns (23-7), but TSU took the fourth set to force a decisive fifth set which saw three tied scores and two lead changes. ASU led the fifth set 4-3 on an attacking error and the set was tied at five on a Zoey Hanrahan kill. The TexAnns took a 7-5 advantage on a Hailey Roberts kill and the game was narrowed to one on an Abbie Lynn kill, but TSU would take the next three points and then had a 12-9 lead on a Kaitlyn White kill. A setting error brought the Belles to within two at 12-10 before two straight kills made it 14-10 and set up championship point which came at 15-11 with an Ashley Rine kill.

Brianna Sotello led the Belles with 15 kills and eight digs in the match, while Lynn finished with 14 kills and a .273 attacking percentage. Hanrahan had 10 kills and three blocks with Alexa Johnson providing 51 assists and 14 digs for the Belles. Shelby Wilt led the team with 19 digs and Katie MacLeay had 10 digs.
Wilt, Hanrahan and Lynn were each named to the LSC Championship all-tournament team for their production in the wins over Eastern New Mexico and Cameron and their contributions in the loss to Tarleton.

The Belles were limited to a .173 team attacking percentage and were out-blocked 16-7 in the match by the TexAnns. ASU committed 32 errors in the five-set match, including nine errors in the first and fourth sets.

Roberts led the TexAnns with 19 kills on 49 attacks, while Kenya Alexander provided nine blocks and 11 kills. TSU finished the match with a .217 attacking percentage and had 25 errors. ASU had a 68-58 dig advantage, but the TexAnns hit .355 in the fourth set and .333 in the fifth set with only six errors combined in the final two sets.

TSU is now 2-1 against the Belles this season with the two teams playing two five-set matches in the past week. ASU earned a five-set win last Friday against the TexAnns in the last LSC regular-season match at the Junell Center. The tournament championship was the first in TSU program history, while the Belles are now 6-6 in final appearances.