UTEP volleyball continues Ben Wallis-era momentum during dominate Borderland Invite showing

On Sept. 7, UTEP played against Air Force, and won all three sets, giving the team their second win. Photo courtesy of UTEP Athletics.

Byline photo of Emmanuel Rivas Valenzuela

Emmanuel Rivas Valenzuela, Editor-in-Chief • September 11, 2024

Continuing its winning legacy under Head Coach Ben Walis is the UTEP volleyball team. This time was the team’s dominant performance in the Borderland Invitational Tournament at Memorial Gym.

In its three games, the Miners came into their opening set with an unforgiving performance ending this first set 25-10.

Thursday versus Southeastern Louisiana

In its opening matchup, the Miners came in with two wins under its belt after competing in the Utah Invitational Tournament. There, Miners swept reigning Mountain West Champions Utah State 3-0.

Maintaining that momentum, the Miners came into their opening set with an unforgiving performance ending the first set 25-10.

UTEP recorded nine kills in its first set against the Southeastern Louisiana defense.

Senior outside hitter Ema Uskokovic led UTEP in kills with 10 followed by junior outside hitter Torrance Lovesee with seven.

The Miners ended day one with nine aces, 11 blocks, and a .320 hitting percentage.

Friday versus Air Force

In the Miners’ next matchup against Air Force, junior middle blocker Kaya Weaver broke her career-high in kills with 14 and recorded a .765 hitting percentage. This was during UTEP’s second 3-0 win for the tournament.

The Miners kept Air Force under 20 points in all three of the match’s sets. The largest deficit of Friday for Air Force was in the first set with the miners outscoring the Mountain West team 25-16.

Uskokovic once again scored double digit kills with 12 against Air Force.

Junior setter Mattie Gantt and sophomore setter Kalia Kohler each combined for a whopping 34 assists on the night.

Saturday versus Stephen F. Austin

In its final game of the weekend, the Miners faced Stephen F. Austin. This would be the only match where the Miners dropped a set during the entire tournament.

UTEP started by winning its first two matches 29-15 and 25-19. It was not until the third that Stephen F. Austin found the upper hand, outscoring the Miners 25-20.

It would be enough to turn the tides as in the very next set, UTEP sealed its undefeated weekend 25 to 18 in the final set.

Uskokovic leads the team in kills for the second time during the tournament with a weekend high of 16 kills. Lovesee followed with 13 kills.

Following the tournament win, Wallis paid his appreciation to the Southland Conference team.

“It was tough, and Stephen F. Austin gave us everything they had,” said Wallis. “We faltered a bit in the third set—some of the challenges got really long and threw off our rhythm because we were rolling, and it just got us out of sorts. SFA earned that set, but we came back strong. This was a great team victory over another NCAA participant and conference champion.”

The Miners now head to Vermillion, South Dakota from Friday Sept. 13 to Sunday Sept. 15 for the South Dakota Classic Tournament. There the Miners will face off against Montana State, South Dakota and the volleyball powerhouse Iowa State.

Emmanuel Rivas Valenzuela Armendariz is the editor-in-chief and may be reached at [email protected]: @rivasemmanuel2 on Instagram.

About the Contributor

Emmanuel Rivas Valenzuela, Editor-in-Chief

Emmanuel Rivas Valenzuela is a senior majoring in multimedia journalism with a minor in political science and chicano studies. Rivas is the editor-in-chief at The Prospector and has worked as a sports editor, writing contributor and as a bilingual writer at Minero Magazine. Outside of Student Media, Rivas has interned for McClatchy as a copy editor, El Paso Matters and a news reporter and most recently at KERA in Dallas-Fort Worth as Radio and News Reporter.