Box Score CANYON – Tarleton's volleyball season has come to an end with a four-set loss to the Texas A&M-Commerce Lions in the Lone Star Conference Championship Tournament Quarterfinals.
 
This is just the second time in the nine-year head coaching career of Mary Schindler that Tarleton has bowed out in the first round of the tournament. The last time came in Schindler's third year at the helm in 2007.
 
In the opening set, neither team was able to take an early advantage as lead shifted back-and-forth with the score coming to a tie 10 times in the first 34 points – through 17-17. The Lions took a two-point advantage after that, but the TexAnns knotted the score at 21-21.
 
Commerce broke the 21-21 tie with a kill shot that started a 4-1 run to give the Lions the opening set 25-22.
 
The Lions carried that momentum into the second set, building a 9-5 lead and forcing a Tarleton timeout. Macie Walker delivered a kill out of the break and sparked a 12-8 TexAnn run to bring the game back even at 17-17.
 
The teams traded the next eight points to make it 21-21 before a kill from Katie Covell and a service ace by Kaitlyn White gave Tarleton a 23-21 advantage.
 
The Lions battled back to even the game at 23-23 and the teams swapped points through 25-25 before Jazmine Green landed a kill shot and Commerce committed an attack error to secure the game and even the match at 1-1.
 
In the third set, Tarleton dropped a 30-28 marathon after battling back from a six-point deficit midway through the game.
 
With the Lions leading 16-10, Covell landed a kill shot that sent the TexAnns on a 10-4 run to finally bring the set back to even at 20-20.
 
The Lions went to a point-22 scenario before back-to-back kills from Covell and Danielle Barker forced extra points at 24-24. Commerce had the advantage four times in the extra possessions with Tarleton taking it once at 27-26, but the Lions prevailed in the third set by scoring four of the final five points.
 
In the fourth set, Tarleton rallied from an early four-point deficit at 6-10 with a 9-2 run of their own to take a 15-12 lead.
 
Commerce answered with three straight points and five of the next six to retake the lead at 17-16. They went on to an 8-4 run to end the set 25-20 and the match 3-1.
 
For the match, Jazmine Green and Covell led the team in kills with 19 and 13, respectively. The LSC Co-Offensive Player of the Year, Stacie Murrah, left the match in the third set and missed the remainder of the marathon third set. She finished with five kills.
 
Barker led the team with 32 assists while Walker added 15 off the bench. The LSC Libero of the Year, Emily Klein, was the only TexAnn with double-figure kills at 23. Klein's 23 digs were enough to give her 604 for the season – making her the only TexAnn ever with more than 600 digs in a season.
 
This game is the final one in the careers of Tarleton's four seniors – Green, Murrah, Barker and Klein.
 
Barker, Klein and Murrah end their four-year careers with their names all over the TexAnn record books. Murrah, who played all 129 matches of her four-year career, ends her career with 1,117 kills. That makes her sixth all-time and one of seven TexAnns with 1,000 in her career.
 
Klein ends her career in second place on the all-time digs list with 1,656 and the top two single-season dig records with 599 last season and 604 this season.
 
Barker has overtaken the top spot on Tarleton's all-time assist record with 3,324 in her career.
 
Tarleton finished the 2013 season with a 15-14 record overall, 8-8 in LSC play and its fourth consecutive LSC Championship Tournament appearance.