Texas rallies past Michigan in NCAA volleyball semis

• No. 3 seed Texas eliminated unseeded Michigan in five sets to advance to the national title game
• Texas (28-3) will go for its first national title since 1998 against the winner of Oregon-Penn State
• Michigan (27-12) was making its first appearance in the national semifinals

LOUISVILLE — The beginning and the ending were fantastic for the Texas women's volleyball team, and that earned the Longhorns a trip to the national title game last night.

Third-seeded Texas used dominating first and fourth sets and a solid fifth-set performance to eliminate unseeded Michigan in the first match of the NCAA Final Four before 13,385 at the KFC Yum! Center.

The final scores were 25-11, 21-25, 23-25, 25-12, 15-11.

"The fans got their money's worth," Texas coach Jerritt Elliott said. "What a battle."

Sha'Dare McNeal's powerful kill from the right side capped the victory for Texas (28-4), which will go for its first national championship since 1988 in Saturday night's final against Oregon.

The Ducks defeated top-seeded Penn State 3-1 and will play for its first Division I volleyball title.

The Wolverines (27-12), which tied for sixth in the Big Ten Conference, saw its surprise run to the Final Four end.

Michigan was making its first appearance in the national semifinals and was only the second team without one of the tournament's 16 national seeds to ever advance that far.

The Wolverines looked outgunned in a near-perfect first set for Texas, struggling at times to kill balls against the tall, athletic Longhorns, who have five players 6 feet 3 or taller. Michigan has two players that tall.

Michigan coach Mark Rosen said Texas was the most athletic opponent the Wolverines have faced this season.

The Wolverines took a 4-2 lead in the first set but couldn't gain traction after that.

Texas responded with a 12-1 run to take a commanding lead.

The Longhorns had a dazzling .469 hitting percentage in the first set, and Michigan had as many hitting errors (seven) as kills.

But the Wolverines weren't deterred and bounced back to hold narrow leads for much of the next two sets, trying to raise the tempo and improve its passing.

"We literally joked after the first game that everyone made every error they could that first game, so we got those out of the way," Michigan hitter Lexi Erwin said. "The next set, we thought, 'They have the No. 3 next to their name; we don't. We don't have any pressure on us, so we just played loose."

Erwin was a hitting force with seven kills in the second set and nine in the third.

She finished with a match-high 26 kills.

The fourth set was all Texas again. Like the first set, the Longhorns had only one hitting error, and Texas' hitting percentage was .455.

The first- and fourth-set losses were Michigan's largest margins of defeat in any sets this season.

In the deciding fifth set, the score was tied at 8, but Texas ran off three consecutive points to take control, capped with a strong kill down the left side from a soaring Bailey Webster, who had 18 kills.

"They're high flyers," Erwin said.

Three other Texas players had double-digit kills: Haley Eckerman (16), McNeal (13) and Khat Bell (11).

The Longhorns also got important digs in the fifth set from libero Sarah Palmer, who finished with a match-high 31 digs. She stopped three of Erwin's strong shots with the match in the balance.

"I'll bet on Lexi every time in that situation," Rosen said. "The libero made three great saves."

Texas is in the Final Four for the eighth time and the fourth time in five years under Elliott, who's in his 12th year. But the Longhorns have won only the 1988 title.

They have been national runners-up twice.

"I've been joking back at home that this monkey has grown into a gorilla on my back," Elliott said with a laugh. "… But I'm happy to be the one representing this university. … We're going to give it our best shot."

Steve Jones also writes for The (Louisville) Courier-Journal