Final Stats

By Paul Watley | @PRWatley

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - UT Arlington got the job done on the opening day of the Razorback Invitational, picking up a sweep (25-19, 25-21, 25-17) over Southeast Missouri State at Barnhill Arena on Friday afternoon.

With the two teams tied at 16 apiece in the opening frame, the Mavericks rattled off nine out of 12 points to take the set 25-19. The run included seven straight points by UTA that was highlighted by three service aces in four serves by Cassidy Wheeler.

Looking at a 13-13 tie in the second set, the Mavericks used another run to take control of the set, scoring six out of seven en route to a 19-14 lead. The Redhawks cut the lead down to one point at 22-21, but it was too little, too late as the a pair of Stacey Koch kills coupled with a SEMO attack error gave UTA the set 25-21.

Trailing to Southeast Missouri 13-12 in the third set, UT Arlington was able to once again put together an impressive run that put them in control of the match. The Mavericks finished out the set scoring 13 of the final 17 points of the set to take the set 25-17 and the match 3-0.

Player of the Match
Koch provided a strong and much-needed presence offensively for the Mavericks, putting up a match-high 16 kills to go along with her hitting percentage of .600. The Colony native has posted double-digit kills in all but two of UTA's matches this season, averaging a team-high 3.56 kills per set.

Stat Leaders
Cassidy Wheeler did her part to direct the Maverick offense with 36 assists. Qiana Canete's 14 digs led the team as she also notched seven kills and three blocks in the match. Pacing UTA at the net was freshman Marisah Ingram who assisted on six blocks in the sweep, helping the Mavs out-block the Redhawks 7.5-2.

Setting the Tone
UT Arlington has claimed the opening set of its matches seven times this season and has come away with a victory in each of those matches. The two times UTA has not won the first set, they have lost in five sets in matches against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and Denver.

Cleaning Up
The sweep over Southeast Missouri to open up the weekend was the sixth of the season for the Mavericks. During the 2014 campaign, UTA registered 14 sweeps, including six in the first nine matches of the season.

Records
The Mavericks improve to 7-2 on the season, including a 5-2 mark in tournament play. The loss drops Southeast Missouri's record to 2-5 on the season.

Quotable
"Stacey would probably be one of the differences. She just had an outstanding match and is hard to defend when she's rolling like that and being so low error. I thought we served the ball very tough too so I think that was a good thing too. We only missed one and were able to put up eight aces so that was able to help us out too. I don't think we were as sharp as we needed to be. We seem to just being playing good enough to win right now and hopefully we pick it up tomorrow." -UT Arlington coach Diane Seymour on difference in the match

"It's a huge impact and a lot of that you owe to Cassidy too because even if the pass isn't straight to target, Cassidy finds a way to put a really good ball up for Stacey to be successful. People aren't expecting it to come back that way; they're expecting it to go to our outsider hitters. I think we catch a lot of blockers off guard and put her in a lot of one on one situations and she puts the ball away when there's only one blocker up." -Seymour on the impact of Koch and Wheeler

"We did a lot of good things as a team. We had a little low point in the middle of the whole game, but we just kept getting better all the way until the end." -Koch on picking up the win

"I'm excited. The other team we were playing, their gameplay was a lot better and I know we can step up in our gameplay and can be twice as good as we played today. I'm excited to see how we do tomorrow." -Koch on mindset heading into final day of invitational

Up Next
The Mavs will return to the court on Saturday with matches against Northwestern State and Arkansas. The match against the Lady Demons is set to begin at 1 p.m. CT. UTA will wrap up the Razorback Invitational against Arkansas in a 7 p.m. CT match that will be aired online on SEC Network+.