Box Score LONG BEACH, Calif. – Senior Kyra Holt's 14 kills led the Washington State volleyball team (5-1) to a 25-14, 25-20, 25-23 sweep over Long Beach State (2-3) Saturday night at the Long Beach State Mizuno Invitational at the Walter Pyramid in Long Beach, Calif. WSU had the best record of the two-school tournament (UC Irvine also hosted) but not every school played one-another so there was no tournament champion declared.
 
In addition to the 14 kills, Holt hit .357, had nine digs, two blocks and one ace. Hailey Bethune added eight kills and four blocks while McKenna Woodford and Casey Schoenlein contributed six kills each. Claire Martin led the match with six blocks with Mims and Schoenlein each adding five more blocks. Haley MacDonald and Nicole Rigoni each set up 15 assists with Rigoni also getting 10 digs. Alexis Dirige led the match with 12 digs.
 
Nele Barber led Long Beach State with seven kills but hit .000 for the match. YiZhi Xue had six kills and five blocks. Anete Brinke added four kills and four blocks while Missy Owens set up 41 assists.
 
WSU hit .214 on the night but held the 49ers to a .041 hitting percentage. Additionally, WSU out-hit the home team 41-25, won the digs battle 43 to 34, and out-blocked LBSU 13 to 8.
 
The Cougars found themselves trailing 10-4 in the third set, but WSU went on a 14-7 run and then traded side-outs with the 10th tie of the set coming at 23-all. An errant attack by Barber followed by a kill from Mims gave WSU the 25-23 win and the three-set sweep. Long Beach State had received votes in the AVCA Top 25 Preseason Coaches Poll.
 
"I'm very happy with the win and very proud of this team that they stuck through some things with a very good Long Beach State team. Overall it was a great weekend and I'm happy to be getting out of her at 3-0," WSU Head Coach Jen Greeny said. "I talked about getting our outside hitters with some better numbers and McKenna Woodford did that in this morning's match and Kyra Holt turned around and had great numbers tonight. I'm proud of the way we blocked and part of that had to do with our serving tonight which was very, very good."
 
"We really haven't been looking ahead, even when we come to a tournament where there is a bigger name to play that teams tend to focus on but I don't think we've been doing that at all. That shows some maturity from this group of Cougar volleyball players," Greeny said. "Now we have to work on some other things in practice and hopefully put it all together next weekend."
 
The WSU volleyball team will play its first home matches of the 2016 season Sept. 9-10. WSU hosts the Cougar Challenge tournament taking on Maryland Eastern Shore, George Washington and Idaho in matches in Bohler Gym.