OREM, UTAH --- Despite a valiant comeback effort in the third and fourth sets, the No. 4 UT Arlington volleyball team (20-10) suffered a heartbreaking 15-25, 16-25, 25-22, 25-22, 10-15 loss to No. 5 Utah Valley (13-16) in a Western Athletic Conference (WAC) quarterfinal match in Lockhart Arena on Thursday.
 
Hosting the tournament on its home court, the Wolverines scored the first six and nine of the first 10 points in the fifth. UTA answered with five of the next seven points behind a trio of kills from Brianna Ford and eventually trimmed the deficit to 13-10. Utah Valley, however, scored the final two points to eliminate UTA from the tournament.
 
A big reason for the comeback came from the middle with the presence of Paige Reagor. After just five total attacks in the first two sets, the senior middle blocker hit .563 with nine kills and zero errors over sets three and four. She ultimately finished with 11 for the match with a .500 hitting percentage and four blocks.
 
Ford capped her fourth year at UTA with another tremendous performance, tallying 20 kills, 12 digs and three blocks. It was her fifth outing with at least 20 kills and 10 digs this season alone, and she recorded her 11th double-double over the past 13 matches.
 
Jalie Tritt finished second on the team with 15 kills, a .344 hitting percentage, nine digs and two assists. It was the fifth 15+ kill performance of her sophomore campaign.
 
UTA's all-time digs leader, Alli Wells, concluded her career in Arlington with a match-best 16 digs and two assists. She finishes with 2,076 all-time and recorded 103 matches with 10+ digs and 71 with at least 15 digs in her career.
 
Mollie Blank totaled 51 assists for her third performance with at least 50 this season. She added eight digs and two blocks while her streak of 15 consecutive matches with at least one kill came to an end.
 
With the loss, UTA falls to 54-32 all-time in conference tournament play, which includes quarterfinal round losses in 2012 and 2022. They are now 17-11 in quarterfinal games and 8-3 against No. 5 seeds. This was the second straight year that Utah Valley ended the season for the Mavs.
 
Utah Valley advances to Friday's semifinal round to face No. 1 Stephen F. Austin.
   
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