East Carolina Vanquishes North Texas In Five Sets

Sunday, October 6

Greenville, N.C.

1:00 p.m.

East Carolina University

10-4,3-1AAC

North Texas

6-9,3-1AAC

North Texas

East Carolina

October 06, 2024 | Volleyball

Box Score Game Book (PDF)

GREENVILLE, N.C. – East Carolina knew it would have to match the offensive prowess of North Texas Sunday afternoon and the Pirates were certainly up to the task, outlasting the Mean Green 3-2 (24-26, 25-22, 16-25, 25-23, 15-12) in a pivotal early season American Athletic Conference match inside Williams Arena at Minges Coliseum.

ECU (10-4, 3-1 AAC) kept pace near the top of the standings and in position for the one of the eight available spots in the conference tournament with the win while handing North Texas (6-9, 3-1 AAC) its first league loss of the campaign.

The Mean Green, who entered the contest off a dominant sweep of Charlotte and as the AAC leader in hitting percentage (.233), lived up the billing as North Texas registered 68 kills on 165 attempts with 14 errors to fire at .327 efficiency. However, it was East Carolina who finished with the upper hand in total kills (69-68) and digs (73-61) while hitting a solid .292 itself. The Mean Green held a slight edge in total blocks (5.0-4.0) while both sides collected five service aces.

Angeles Alderete, the American Conference Preseason Player of the Year, paced all players and led three Pirates in double figures with 22 kills. She added five assists and 10 digs to notch her fifth double-double of the season. Alderete also became the 11th player in program history to record 1,000 career kills with her 15th of the day in the fourth set. Ellie Pate smashed her career high in kills by exploding for 20 and a .326 hitting percentage while Fran McBride matcher her season and career best with 16 and hit a stout .481 with just three errors in 27 swings. The setter tandem of Payton Evenstad (34 assists/12 digs) and Taryn Gilreath (24 assists/12 digs) also logged double-doubles – the first of Gilreath's young career in the Purple and Gold.

Have yourself a day, Angeles! 🤩 pic.twitter.com/8oCWZtKNwt
— East Carolina Volleyball (@ECUVB) October 6, 2024

North Texas put four hitters in double figures, paced by Aryn Johnson and Payton Van Veen who tallied 15 kills apiece. Kamryn Scroggins also posted a double-double of 40 assists and 12 digs.

Set One: ECU drifted out to an early 13-9 advantage following a kill by Pate as the Mean Green utilized the first timeout of the afternoon. The Pirates seemed to pull away, leading 18-12 after an Alderete kill, but North Texas rallied all the way back to within 22-21. Pate unleashed another swing to make it 23-21 followed by a quick 2-0 Mean Green run that knotted things up at 23 before Alderete put East Carolina set point, but North Texas had the last word and netted the final three rallies to steal the stanza.

Set Two: The teams battled to a 13-13 deadlock in the second, but a kill and Pirate attacking error allowed the Mean Green to grab a two-point edge at the media timeout. Unfazed, ECU started to find some offensive success at that point and outscored the visitors 6-1 to propel in front 19-16. The Pirates did a nice job siding out the rest of the set and Alderete put the frame to bed with another kill.

Set Three: East Carolina fell behind early in the third and could not recover, hitting just .094 in the period. North Texas established leads of 9-4 and 15-7 before seeing out the remainder of the set.

Set Four: A 4-0 serving run by Kenzie Beckham afford the Pirates some breathing room in the fourth frame at 10-6 and the advantage only grew from there as a kill by Aulie Huff made the score 19-13. The set grew tighter in the latter stages when an ECU attacking error sliced the Pirate lead to 22-21, but McBride responded with a pair of scores of her own to send the Purple and Gold to set point. The Mean Green stayed alive with two-straight points, but Pate mustered up a nice swing to register the kill and force the deciding stanza.

Set Five: North Texas forced East Carolina into using an early timeout, starting the set by scoring five of the first six points. Following the brief break, the Pirates summoned up a 5-1 run of their own to pull even at six. The Mean Green put together the next run, utilizing two-straight Coco Gillett kills and an ECU attacking error to push in front 9-6, but the Pirates responded once more – fighting and scrapping their way to a 12-11 lead. Ryann Vik scored the next point to force the fourth tie score of the set and the race to 15 entered its final stretch. Determined to keep its perfect home record intact, East Carolina swung for the fences the last three rallies and came up with a trio of massive kills to cement the victory.

The Pirates improved to 2-1 in the all-time series with the Mean Green and 2-0 in Greenville.
East Carolina remained unbeaten at home at 5-0 and has dropped just two of 17 sets inside the friendly confines.
In addition to reaching the 1,000-kill mark for her career, Alderete moved within six of tying Ashton Mares (2014-17) for 10th on the ECU career list. Evenstad is also now 10th on the program career chart in assists with 1,840.
The Pirates' 69 kills Sunday are their second most ever in an American Athletic Conference match while the 67 assists match the top mark (also versus Cincinnati back on Oct. 9, 2022).
Head Coach Adler Augustin logged his 56th victory at East Carolina Sunday and is one away from matching Kim Walker (1995-99) for fourth in program history.

Up Next: The Pirates travel west next week for a pair of conference bouts at Tulane (Oct. 11) and Rice (Oct. 13).