This past weekend, the Bulldogs of Mississippi State University tried their luck against two types of Gamecocks. State opened up play on Friday, taking on the No.18 South Carolina Gamecocks. USC spoiled the Bulldogs home SEC opener with a 3-0 win. The Gamecocks jumped out early, hitting a .500 clip to down the Bulldogs in game one 30-20. The Bulldogs looked in control of the second game but could not hold South Carolina off.
With the game tied at 28-28, USC took over and pulled out a 31-29 win and a 2-0 lead at the intermission.
“USC has a very good and athletic team,” MSU coach Brenda Bowlin said. “Still, we had plenty of opportunities to score some points. Most of those opportunities got wiped out by errors tonight. We can’t afford to make that many against the No. 18 team.”
The Gamecocks did not miss a step after the intermission, as they had only one hitting error en route to a 30-19 match-winning third game. Misty Hubenthal led the team with eight kills, and Lauren Bounds finished with seven.
“We need to find balance and put both our offense and defense together. We had good defense tonight but didn’t have any offense to put with it,” Bowlin stated.
State returned to the Newell-Grissom Building on Saturday to tangle with the Gamecocks of Jacksonville State. JSU was under the helm of former MSU assistant Jose Rivera.
The Bulldogs bounced back nicely from the previous night’s loss to USC and bested JSU 3-0. Ten different Bulldogs added kills, as MSU won the non-conference contest.
“We put together a complete game, had more rhythm and received a great job by our bench,” Bowlin said.
The Bulldogs out-hit the Gamecocks, .269 to .135, led in kills by Hubenthal with eleven. Bounds also contributed nine kills and no errors en route to a .563 hitting performance. Bounds led the team with eight digs, in which MSU had a 42-37 edge over JSU.
State fell behind early in game one, as JSU jumped out 7-3, but MSU would not be denied. State went on a 8-0 run and won the game 30-21. The Bulldogs held off a Gamecock rally in game two to take a 2-0 match lead with a 30-28 win over JSU. MSU took control early in game three with an 8-0 advantage over JSU in which the Gamecocks could not recover and won the match with a 30-11 win.
“We focused on playing aggressive and creating plays,” Bowlin said. “We had a complete game.”
The Bulldogs (6-5) travel to Birmingham, Ala. to take on another set of Bulldogs today, as MSU squares off against Samford at 7 p.m. MSU returns to SEC play on Friday and Sunday at Newell-Grissom, as the Bulldogs host the LSU Tigers for a Friday 7 p.m. start and then the Razorbacks of Arkansas come calling for a 2 p.m. start on Sunday.