A standing-room-only crowd packed the University of Mississippi’s Gillom Sports Center as Greek organizations competed for $500 while the Lady Rebels (9-10, 2-5 SEC) defeated the Mississippi State Bulldogs (10-11, 1-6 SEC) by a score of 3-0. The enthusiastic crowd of 1,368 spiked singing “Hotty Toddy” with the chant, “State sucks!,”and passed it around the room like a cheap bottle of bourbon. The Rebels thrived on the energy and hit .350 in the opening game en route to a 30-21 victory.
“I’ve never seen anything like this at Ole Miss,” said MSU head coach Brenda Bowlin. “You have to give their marketing people credit for creating an environment that was tough to play in.”
“We couldn’t hear anything, but that is no excuse,” said Bulldog senior Misty Hubenthal. “The louder the crowd got, the more I wanted to beat them, but we just couldn’t.”
State became more accustomed to the environment as the match progressed. The Bulldog defense gave its best effort in Game 2, holding the Rebels to a .195 hitting percentage. Both teams see-sawed back and forth until three questionable line calls on serves gave UM the edge they needed to get a crucial 30-24 victory.
MSU came out after intermission and took an early Game 3 lead before mistakes prevailed and UM finished the ‘Dawgs 30-27.
“It seems when we get in the 20’s, we will have three or four points down the stretch where we have mental breakdowns,” said Bowlin.
In the match, the Bulldogs committed 10 service errors and seven service return errors.
“We’re not playing with discipline. We’re letting balls drop, not doing the little things, and we’re choking down the stretch,” said Hubenthal, whose 11-kill, 11-dig performance was her 11th double double of the season.
“We played hard tonight, but just couldn’t pull it out,” said junior Jennifer Rousey.
Rousey led the Bulldogs in hitting percentage (.471) with a 10-kill, 2-error effort, and freshman Rachel Cooper added 10 kills to supplement the ‘Dawgs’ attack.
“It was hard to hear, but I had good chemistry with (my setter) Jennifer Hadden,” added Rousey.
Elena Garcia led the Rebel offense and defense, tallying a 16-kill, 15-dig performance. Junior libero Tanika Taylor maintained the Bulldog defense with a gritty 17-dig effort before leaving Game 3 due to a knee injury.
“The trainer said it might be a torn meniscus,” said Taylor. “We are gonna try to get an MRI tomorrow. The pain is not that bad right now, but it hurt when it happened.”
The Bulldogs return to Newell-Grissom to host the Tennessee Volunteers at 2 p.m. Sunday in the only remaining October home match.