BATON ROUGE, La. – The Georgia volleyball team rallied from a 2-0 deficit to win the third set and take 20th-ranked LSU to the wire in the fourth set before falling, 3-1, to the Tigers on Friday night at the Maravich Center.

LSU won the first two sets, 25-18 and 25-17, but UGA bounced back out of the break to take the third set 25-23. In the fourth set, the Bulldogs tied it at 22-22 before the Tigers went on to win the set and match at 25-23. With the win, LSU improved to 17-5 overall and 11-2 in Southeastern Conference play while UGA dropped to 14-10 overall and 5-8 in league action.

“We are all disappointed with the loss, but it’s not because we didn’t work for it,” Georgia head coach Joel McCartney said. “The threat of our play in the third and fourth sets put the decision of this match in the balance, and we gave LSU a great battle tonight. Not every individual played their best tonight, but as a team, we played together and battled our tails off.”

The Tigers held an advantage offensively over the Bulldogs in the duel by recording 58 kills on a .217 hitting percentage compared to 51 kills at a .141 clip. LSU also held a narrow edge defensively with 12.0 blocks and 69 digs compared to UGA’s 8.0 blocks and 64 digs. The biggest difference statistically in the match was that LSU picked up seven aces while Georgia had two.

“I want to give credit to a very experienced and mature LSU team,” McCartney stated. “They hung in there long enough to squeeze this one out and that is a tribute to their entire staff and team. LSU certainly deserves the top-20 ranking they have, and these kinds of matches let us know more about how to get our program there. We will take away the understanding from tonight that as we continue to battle together we can compete with everyone in this league and keep moving the Georgia program forward.”

LSU was paced in the match by Brittnee Cooper and Marina Skender. Cooper recorded a match-best 16 kills on a .542 clip, and Skender posted a double-double with 13 kills and a team-best 16 digs.

Junior outside hitter Erika Clark recorded a double-double in her fourth-straight match to lead the Bulldogs. Clark finished with 12 kills while providing 13 digs, and it was her ninth double-double of the season. Supporting Clark offensively, junior middle hitter Valentina Gonzalez notched 11 kills on a .360 mark. On the other side of the net, sophomore libero Carla Tietz guided defensive output by registering a match-best 21 digs.

Friday’s match in Baton Rouge concluded Georgia’s play for this week as the Bulldogs will have an off-date on Sunday after having played and won a midweek tilt against Auburn on Wednesday. UGA returns to action next weekend with two more road matches at Florida (Nov. 6) and at South Carolina (Nov. 8).

- Georgia Sports Communications