POCATELLO, Idaho — Sacramento State won the first two sets, and held an 11-5 lead in the third, but it was Idaho State that stormed back to beat the Hornets in five sets (20-25, 23-25, 25-14, 25-20, 15-12), on Thursday evening at Reed Gym.

The match marked the Big Sky Conference opener for both teams as the Hornets begin league play with four straight road matches. Sacramento State dropped to 5-6 overall and 0-1 in the Big Sky, which Idaho State improved to 5-8 and 1-0. The Hornets were playing without the services of outside hitter Caitlin Volkmann (2nd on the team with 2.29 kps) because of injury.

Things were looking good with the Hornets up two sets, and an ISU error had just given SAC an 11-5 lead in the third set. However, the Bengals responded with a shocking 20-3 run to close out the third set. They held a sizable lead the entire fourth set before winning, 25-20.

That set up a fifth set in which the Hornets held leads of 7-3, 8-5, and 12-10. After Idaho State committed a double that gave the Hornets the 12-10 lead, the Bengals closed on a 5-0 run. Making things more frustrating is the Hornets saw four different players commit service errors in the set.

After hitting .314 in the first set, Sacramento State hit .160 or less during each of the final four frames. They did limit the Bengals to a .042 hitting percentage and just five kills in the fifth set, but the four service errors were a back breaker. In fact, the Bengals scored six points from the service line in the fifth, which included two aces. ISU committed zero service errors in the fifth.

Overall, the Hornets had seven more kills (56-49), but hit a season-low .082 and allowed Idaho State to amass a whopping 18 team blocks. The Hornets also had eight more digs than the Bengals (64-56).

Sacramento State had three players finish with double figures in kills. Bridgette Smith had a team-high 15 kills to go with eight digs. Macey Hayden had a double-double (11 kills, 11 digs), and she tacked on two blocks. Hayden was very good in the fifth set with four kills in six swings. Rightside hitter Karlee Soderberg had a career-high 12 kills.

Libero Caty Cordano had a season-high 21 digs. Sacramento State went back to its 6-2 offense, and setters McKenna Smith (27 ast, 1 ace, 7 digs) and Ashtin Olin (19 ast, 2 aces, 9 digs) combined for 46 assists, three aces and 16 digs. Kalani Hayes had six kills and a team-high four blocks, Ellie Tisko five kills and two blocks, and Tiyanane Kamba-Griffin three kills and a block.

Idaho State was led by Kaia Rhodes who had six kills, nine blocks and a .500 hitting percentage.

Sacramento State returns to action on Saturday afternoon at 1 p.m. PDT when the team travel to Ogden, Utah, to take on Weber State.