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Sept. 12, 2008

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AUSTIN, Texas -- The third-ranked Texas Volleyball team used a match-high 18 kills by junior All-America outside hitter Destinee Hooker to knock off Georgia, 3-1 (25-21, 22-25, 25-13, 25-17) on Friday night at the Time Warner Cable Texas Invitational. The Longhorns improved to 6-1 on the year and extended their home winning streak to 18 matches, while Georgia fell to 7-4 on the year.

Georgia kept the score close early in the first set, but a 4-0 run capped by a Lauren Paolini kill gave the Longhorns their largest lead at the 15-10 mark. The Bulldogs rallied to close the gap to 21-19, but a 4-0 run and three kills by Hooker pushed Texas to a 25-21 set win.

In the second set, Texas fell behind quickly, allowing Georgia to go on a 5-0 run and clinch an 8-3 edge. The Longhorns battled back to tie the set at 13 on a solo block by junior All-America opposite hitter Ashley Engle, but failed to forge ahead as the Bulldogs widened the margin to three and closed out the set, 25-22.

The Longhorns bounced back in the third stanza, opening the set on a 9-1 run that was highlighted by three Hooker kills. Georgia responded, closing the margin to four (9-5), but a 5-0 UT rally paced by three straight Juliann Faucette kills moved the score to 16-8. Texas added a 4-0 run to grab a 23-11 lead and Faucette's fifth kill of the set lifted UT to a 25-13 set win.

In the final frame, Texas posted 12 kills on .524 hitting and only committed one attack error. The Horns led by as many as five in the early going (11-6), but a 3-0 Bulldogs rally shrank the deficit to 12-11. Texas responded with a 4-0 run that pushed the lead to 20-14 and closed out the match with another 4-0 run capped by a Faucette kill that clinched the 25-17 victory.

Texas returns to action on Saturday, Sept. 20 when it kicks off Big 12 Conference play at No. 2 Nebraska. First serve from Lincoln, Neb. is set for 7 p.m. Central.

ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM
Maria Taylor, Georgia
Erika Clark, Georgia
Ingrida Zauere, Houston
Melinda Cave, Texas State
Ashley Engle, Texas
Juliann Faucette, Texas
Most Valuable Libero: Heather Kisner, Texas
Most Valuable Player: Destinee Hooker, Texas

POST-MATCH NOTES

• Texas' victory improved its home winning streak to 18 matches, tying for the third longest streak in program history.
• The Longhorns' win moved Texas to 6-0 all-time against Georgia.
• Sophomore outside hitter Juliann Faucette set a pair of new season-highs against Georgia, recording 17 kills and posting a .500 attack mark.

TEXAS QUOTES
HEAD COACH Jerritt Elliott
General statement: It was great to be challenged. I think it was a good start for us as we get ready to start Big 12 play. I thought Georgia came in here and played probably their best two games of the year. Game two, they had 19 kills out of 25 (total) points, so they were very efficient and did a very nice job. I was very proud of the way we were able to change after game two. We had to make some adjustments and I thought our team responded very well to it. It showed a lot of heart and class that they were able to do that. Overall, a good performance by our team and I give a lot of credit to Georgia and their coaching staff. They played very well and were very efficient.

On the changes made after the second set: Our blocking was non-existent, and that is one of our strengths. So we made some blocking alignment changes and we tried to stop their right side a little bit more. I think we did an excellent job putting the ball down. We got [Sydney] Yogi in there and she was able to pick up a lot of the tips. Our left side blocking not only did a nice job touching balls, but also funneling balls so that we had more success getting it to the right side.

On being challenged early in the season: The challenge comes when you're as highly ranked as we are and teams are bringing their best game. Georgia got to see us play two times here and they got to see what we're capable of doing. That was by far the best Georgia had played all tournament. With 25 points, there's not a lot of room for error. We had to raise our game to another level and that was kind of the difference. That was the challenge that we were able to present to them. You could see what their hitting percentage was early on. We couldn't contain them in games one and two. They were very efficient, hitting .417 and .417. They passed and served well, but the difference was we were able to pick up our attacking. We made some adjustments with Michelle [Kocher] in terms of who attacked a and we tried to keep them a bit more off balance. She made some much better set selections and we picked it up on the defensive side.

On the confidence that comes from winning three games and also what the team can improve on: There is a lot we can still work on. I think there is a challenge of what level you can play at consistently and we were able to see that a lot this weekend. We started off playing very well. I was hoping that we were going to get pushed by Georgia. That was the plan when we asked them to come to the tournament. We were able to get that and take our game to a different level. We're going to play a very good Nebraska team next weekend. Yes they lost some players, but they are very efficient in the serve and pass game and they're playing very well right now in front of their home court. With 25 points, you can't go down and try to climb your way back up, it's very difficult.

Lauren Paolini
On coming back home and winning three matches: I think it's an awesome feeling coming home to a crowd like this. They're so supportive and always into the game. It is fun to play here. It was really exciting to come back and play three games in front of them to start our home season.
On Coach Elliott's comments after the second set: It was a lot of what we did on our side. He talked a lot about our errors and the way they were putting a lot of pressure on us. We knew we just had to take care of what was on our side and come back at them. We remembered that we know how to play and that we needed to just go out there, relax and have fun with it.

Juliann Faucette
On coming back home and winning three matches: Like Pao (Lauren Paolini) said, being on two road trips before these matches, it's nice to come and have our fans cheering for us and saying our names. It was exciting and I'm really glad that we got challenged this tournament in front of our supportive fans.
On their readiness going into conference play: I think the fact that, on the road trips and even at home, we've been challenged by these teams is really a good thing for us, especially playing Nebraska which is going to be one of the toughest teams in the Big 12 for us to play.