DELAND, Fla. – The New Mexico State volleyball team hit .350 and dominated South Florida to open the Stetson Invitational in DeLand, Fla., on Friday morning. This was the fourth straight sweep for NM State who has won 12-straight sets.

"We passed and dug it well and gave ourselves a lot of good swing opportunities," said head coach Mike Jordan. "We stayed low error, we had balance and other than how we served, I'm happy with the win over a decent AAC team."
 
The Aggies (7-3, 0-0 WAC) fell behind early in the first set, 5-1, as USF (4-5, 0-0 AAC) came out of the gates firing. However, NM State overcame its shaky start and found itself tied at 18 late in the set. From there, the Aggies closed the set strong and took it 25-22. USF hit just .062 in the frame while NM State hit .273.
 
The second was all Aggies as they jumped out to a 5-1 lead and never looked back on its way to a 25-12 win the second frame. NM State was ultra-efficient in the set, hitting .474 with just one attack error as it held the Bulls to -.040.
 
NM State got out to an early 7-3 lead but USF was able to bring it back to 12-10, forcing an Aggie timeout. Coming out of the timeout, NM State dominated, finishing the Bulls off with a 13-5 run to take the deciding frame. The Aggies hit just two errors in the second and third sets, one in each frame.
 
As a team, the Aggies finished with 36 kills on 80 swings with eight errors as just two of the errors occurred after the first set. NM State's defense was on point as USF was only able to muster a .045 hitting percentage and finished with 27 kills and 23 errors.
 
Individually, Cat Kelly led the way from NM State as she hit 10 kills on 19 swings (.474 HT%) with 10 digs to finish with her first double-double of the season. Sophomore Kalli Schoening was efficient on the morning, finishing with a career-high six kills on 10 swings (.600 HT%) and four blocks while Victoria Barrett added seven kills and seven digs.
 
NM State is back in action at the Stetson Invitational later today, Sept. 17, at 12:30 p.m. (MT) when it takes on Bethune-Cookman. Fans can follow along with live stats here.