Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 WICHITA FALLS – Tarleton State (7-1, 2-0) had a night to remember Friday as the TexAnns swept Midwestern State for their second straight conference win and rallied from an 0-2 deficit to knock off Harding and improve to 7-1 on the season.
  
Tarleton State continued its early-season success in the first of two games Friday night by knocking off Lone Star Conference rival Midwestern State in straight sets.
 
The TexAnns brought their offensive A-game in the conference sweep of the Mustangs, hitting .333 as a team with Kaitlyn White (.333), Hailey Roberts (.412), Kelsey Raglin (.412) and Kenya Alexander (.429) hitting over .300 for the night with at least 15 attempts.
 
Alexander and White got the scoring started with back-to-back kills for the first two points of the set. Tarleton has now scored first in six of the first seven games of the season.
 
Tarleton and Midwestern stayed deadlocked through the first 20 points at 10-10 before Jasmyne Brown landed a kill and served up two straight points – both on kills from White – to extend the lead to 13-10. The Brown kill started a 13-5 run for the TexAnns to a 23-15 lead.
 
Raglin and Roberts answered the call with the final two kills of the set to secure the game one win 25-18.
 
In the second set, Tarleton kept the momentum rolling by jumping out to a 16-10 lead before Midwestern State struck for a 10-6 run to cut the Tarleton lead to 22-20. That was as close as they would get, however, as Tarleton ended the run and the set with an Alexander kill and two Midwestern mistakes to win 25-20 and go up 2-0 in the match.
 
The TexAnns were forced to battle back in the third set after falling behind by as much as three at 8-11 to open the game. A block from Alexander and Raglin, however, shifted the momentum back to Tarleton and Tarleton a 12-9 Tarleton push to even the set at 20-20.
 
A service error turned the serve back over to Tarleton with a 21-20 lead and the TexAnns got three straight points on kills from Raglin and Roberts and a block from Alexander and Raglin to lead 24-20.
 
After back-to-back Midwestern State points, Midwestern State sent a pass just over the net which was sent back with authority by Alexander for the final point of the match.
 
Roberts led the team with 18 kills on 34 attempts with just four errors while Alexander (8-2-14), White (7-1-18) and Raglin (7-0-17) recorded at least seven kills each. This is the second straight game in which a TexAnn had no errors with at least 15 attacks, as Raglin reached the feat after Alexander did it Tuesday night. Prior to the last two games, the feat had not been accomplished since 2010.
 
Chandler Gow had a double-double with 13 assists and 10 digs while Katie Covell led the team in digs with 18, passing Missy Castro and Carie Key for sole possession of fourth place on the all-time digs list with 1,135 career digs. Emily Medlin also led the team in assists with 25.
  
For the second time this week, Tarleton rallied from an 0-2 match deficit against a valiant opponent and came out on top – this time with a five-set thriller against Harding.
 
After sweeping Midwestern in a timely fashion, Tarleton had over an hour to wait for their second set of the night against the Lady Bisons and the first two sets showed signs of a cool down.
 
Tarleton fell in a quick 0-2 hole in the match after hitting less than even as a team, (-).026 in game one and (-).057 in game two. Harding won the first two sets by a combined score of 50-26.
 
The TexAnns came out on fire in the third set, jumping out to an 8-1 start behind the serving of Kaitlyn White. White landed a kill to even the set 1-1 and then served up seven straight points, including three on aces, to give Tarleton an early lead.
 
Harding clawed back to tie the game on two different occasions, including 15-15 and 21-21, but Raglin landed a kill shot out of a Tarleton timeout to start a 4-1, game-clinching rally for the TexAnns.
 
The fourth set saw a similar beginning with the TexAnns jumping out to a quick lead and Harding clawing back to as close as 20-21, but the TexAnns did not break as Alexander landed two kills in the final four points and Katie Covell ended the set with an ace to force a fifth set.
 
Neither team gave an inch in the final set, tying the score on nine different occasions including 17-17 before White and Medlin ended the game with two straight points on a kill and service ace, respectively.
 
The TexAnns showed their heart by winning the match while being out-hit .275 to .131 as a team and committing 15 more errors than Harding.
 
Alexander led the team with 13 kills on a career-high 30 attacks while White added a double-double with 12 kills and 17 digs. Ashley Rine also landed 11 kills in the win while Katie Covell added 17 digs of her own. Medlin posted a career-high 45 assists.
 
Tarleton will wrap up this three-game, two-day stretch tomorrow at 2 p.m. when they head north of the Red River for an afternoon match against Cameron in Aggie Gym.