CEDAR FALLS, Iowa – Missouri State's run through the Missouri Valley Conference Volleyball Championship came to an end Sunday afternoon with a 3-1 (25-20, 25-27, 21-25, 20-25) loss to fourth-seeded Illinois State inside the McLeod Center.
 
Coming off a sweep of Bradley in Saturday's first round, the eighth-seeded Bears (13-19) carried the momentum into an opening set victory, hitting .467 with just one error to take the early lead on the Redbirds (17-15).
 
MoState rallied from a 17-14 deficit in the opening period, closing on an 11-3 run and getting 10 combined kills without an error from Lexi Weinberg (6) and Maddy Bushnell (4).
 
The Bears then jumped out to a 9-4 lead in the second set before the Redbirds gained their first lead at 13-12 thanks to consecutive aces. ISU got to 24-22 and the Bears fought off a trio of set points, but ISU did not commit an attack error in the period. MoState piled up 20 kills but had seven attack errors.
 
The third set was played in a close window to 12-12 until a 5-0 Missouri State run made it 17-12. The Redbirds countered by scoring six in a row and never trailed again, extending the run to 13-4 for the 25-21 victory.
 
Illinois State led for good in the fourth set after an early 4-0 run to 9-4. The Bears closed to 12-11 on a Brooke Eslinger ace but ISU responded with a 3-0 run and led by at least three points the rest of the way.
 
Seniors Iva Halacheva and Bushnell closed out their careers with 14 kills each, with Bushnell hitting .448 and Halacheva .357. Weinberg added 12 kills and Rilynn Finley had 10.
 
Morgan Sprague handed out 46 assists and set the offense to a .265 hitting percentage compared to .326 for the Redbirds.
 
Eslinger led MSU with 14 digs and senior Kate Owen added 12. Bushnell led the Bears with six blocks. Illinois State served 10 aces compared to nine for the Bears.
 
End of season notes: Maddy Bushnell completed her career ranked 12^th in school history with a .287 attack efficiency and 974 kills…Morgan Sprague ends her time at MSU ranked third in school history with 4,078 assists, 13^th with 1,268 digs and eighth with 62 matches of 10-plus digs…She is one of three players with 3,000 assists and 1,000 digs…Kate Owen ranks seventh at MSU with 1,537 career digs and fifth with 84 matches in double figures...Rilynn Finley's 373 kills rank fourth all-time among MSU freshmen, just seven shy of the No. 2 spot…Steven McRoberts ended the season ranked 11^th among active Division I coaches with 657 career victories