Final Stats

By Paul Watley | @PRWatley

ATLANTA, Ga. - UT Arlington defeated Georgia State in a five-set thriller at GSU Sports Arena on Friday night.

After dropping the opening frame of the match 25-22, the Mavericks (14-8, 5-5 Sun Belt) responded early in the second set, using an 18-2 run to take control of the set en route to claiming a 25-9 victory over Georgia State (4-15, 0-9). UTA was faced with the daunting task of forcing a fifth set after it fell 25-20 in the third. However, a 25-17 effort in the fourth paired with a 15-8 fifth set gave the Mavs their fifth conference win of the season.

UTA out-hit, out-blocked and out-dug Georgia State in the match. The Mavericks are now 13-1 this season when out-hitting their opponent.

Stat Leaders
Stacey Koch led UTA in the match with 17 kills to go along with four blocks, while hitting .289. Koch was one of four Maverick players to reach double-digit kills in the match as Qiana Canete and Zhanelle Geathers chipped in 13 kills and Kaitlyn Granger added 10 of her own. Canete also recorded her 12th double-double of the season as she added 11 digs to her stat line.

Leading the defensive efforts was senior libero Caitlyn Cooney who registered a season-high 29 digs in the match. Fellow senior Jordan Holub aided Cooney with a career-high 16 digs of her own in the match.

Cassidy Wheeler paced the UTA offense with 50 assists on the night, the second most in her career. Wheeler also registered her sixth double-double effort of the season as she added 10 digs.

At the net it was Marisah Ingram, Koch and Geathers who set the tone. Ingram led the team with six blocks, while Koch and Geathers came away from the match with four blocks apiece.

Milestone Watch
Cooney positioned herself to climb further up the UTA career charts as she enters Saturday's match with 1,718 career digs. The Houston native currently sits 11 digs shy of passing Jessica Bowlin's 1,728 career digs.

The freshmen duo of Ingram and Geathers continued to make a mark in their first season donning the Maverick uniform with both players climbing up the UTA single-season freshmen charts. Ingram comes away from the match with 88 total blocks this season, the 8th most by a UTA freshmen, and 84 block assists, the fifth most by a Maverick freshman. Geathers also continues to move her way up the freshmen charts as her 83 total blocks and 76 block assists rate ninth all-time by a first-year player.

Quotable
"They just didn't get uptight even when things weren't bouncing their way. We didn't play tight, but were relaxed and they trusted that the hard work they have put in is going to pay off and it did. They were able to play the match relaxed instead of being nervous." - UT Arlington coach Diane Seymour on the difference in tonight's match

"Knowing that if you go down, you have ability to come back. It was also big for us to get our first conference road win and our first series win over a team this season. We talked about it after the match that streaks are meant to be broken and tonight we wanted to break our losing streak and starting a new winning streak." -Seymour on biggest takeaway from the match

"It's something that we mentioned after Texas State. I remember Cooney making a statement to me awhile back that this class was excited about being the winningest class at UTA in a long time and also wanted to win a conference championship. They've got their eyes set on that right now. We did hit a hiccup in the road for a stretch where we didn't play well, but it was great to see them bounce back tonight." -Seymour on the impact of the senior class in tonight's victory

Up Next
The Mavericks will return to action on Saturday as they wrap up their road swing with a match against Georgia Southern. The meeting with the Panthers is slated to begin at 5:30 p.m. CT.