HOUSTON, Texas—No. 3 seed McNeese volleyball upset No. 2 seed Houston Baptist 3-1 (25-17, 26-24, 23-25, 25-20) here Saturday to advance to the Southland Conference Championship match for the first time since 1999. The Cowgirls will play the winner out of the regular season champions and the tournament's top seed Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and No. 5 seed UIW at 2 p.m. Sunday.  The match will be streamed on ESPN+.
 
The loss for HBU was their first home loss of the season as they end their season with a 21-8 overall record and 10-1 home record.
 
"We didn't play perfect but we played great in moments that we needed to," said head coach Kristee Porter. "Today was phenominal, not only offensively but defensively she kept so many ball off the floor. Her and Anyse Smith, that tandem is pretty tough to beat. I thought they played a really good match today.
 
Junior Anyse Smith paced the Cowgirls with a career high 25 kills while freshman Aryn Johnson picked up a double double tying her career high with 18 kills to go along with 12 digs. Libero Lizzy Low also tied her career high with 28 digs to lead all players. Setters Ceci Harness and Bailey Laskoskie dished out over 20 assists apiece with Harness credited with 26 and Laskoskie with 23.
 
As a team, McNeese collected 65 digs while HBU (21-8) was credited with 46.  
 
"Our defense was at another level today. Everybody really had a good defensive match. Our setters were in there digging ball and Lizzy Low always does a great job on defense for us."
 
McNeese (18-10) came out and played inspired ball and opened the match with solid defense to take an early 2-0 overall match lead by taking the first two sets.
 
The opening set was tight until the Cowgirls went on a 7-0 run to take a 22-16 lead. McNeese would go on to outscore the Huskies 3-1 the rest of the way to take the set.
 
McNeese continued its solid play in the second set to take an early 5-1 lead then extended the lead to 16-9 on a Johnson kill. HBU went on a run and eventually tied the set at 21 apiece. With the set tied at 24, Smith took control and scored the last two Cowgirl points for the 26-24 second set win.
 
HBU stayed alive by winning set three but the Cowgirls opened the fourth set with a 5-2 lead to take the early momentum behind the serve of Ceci Harness. HBU got within one point late in the set on a kill by Jada Allen but two kills by Smith and one by Macee Krpec gave the Cowgirls the 25-20 fourth set win and the match victory.