Aggie Volleyball Hangs Tough With Arizona But Falls In 3-0 Sweep

bleedCrimson.net Report
Starting three freshmen against a veteran Arizona team on Saturday afternoon, the Aggies would come up short falling in three sets to the host Wildcats, 25-18, 25-19 and 26-24. The Aggies would battle closely with the Wildcats in the first two sets before Arizona would pull away in the later stages of each set. The Aggies led by two points at 23-21 in set three but could not overcome the Wildcats. "We had three freshmen out there, sometimes four against a good Pac-10 team, that's difficult right now but there was definitely some competition," said head coach Mike Jordan after the match. The Aggie defense had no answer for Arizona's Tiffany Owens who finished the match with a match-high 22 kills on 30 swings with just one attack error and an astounding .700 hitting percentage on the left side. She added 12 digs and a service ace. "We didn't play very good defense in the first game, it was close for a long time but we didn't capitalize on some defensive opportunities," said Coach Jordan. The Aggies' freshman middle blocker Desire Scott, playing in place of injured junior Kelsey Brennan, finished with nine kills on 11 swings and committed no hitting errors for an .818 hitting percentage.
It was the sixth loss in a row for the Aggies, their longest losing steak since losing six in a row in the 1999 season, head coach Mike Jordan's second season at the helm. The Aggies would hang tough with Arizona in the first set early. The Aggies took a 1-0 lead in the set on a kill by Kayleigh Giddens but three straight points gave the Cats a 3-1 lead. The Aggies would keep Arizona in their sights as the Wildcats would lead by three on several occasions and on several occasions the Aggies would cut the Arizona lead to two and have a chance to trim the lead to one, however, they were unable to do so each time. The Wildcats push their lead to five points at 17-12 on a kill by Cursty Jackson. The Aggies would trim the lead to two at 17-15 after a kill by Desiree Scott, a service ace by Shelby Tamura and a bad set by Arizona's Paige Weber. The Aggies would have a chance to cut the lead to one but a kill by Arizona's Whitney Dosty pushed the Wildcat lead to three at 18-15. The Aggies would get a kill on a setter dump by Jenna DeVries to again cut the lead to two points at 18-16 but Arizona would run off three consecutive points to push their lead to 20-16 forcing an Aggie timeout. The Aggies would score just two more points after the timeout as the Wildcats would take the set 25-18. The second set again saw the Aggies hang tough with the Wildcats as the Aggies would lead 3-1 after a kill by Whitney Woods. Three straight points by the Wildcats would push them ahead 4-3. The Aggies would draw even on a service error by Arizona's Marketa Hanzlova. Arizona would run off three points to take a 7-4 lead. The Aggies would battle back to tie the set at 9-9 after a kill by Whitney Woods and would again tie the set at 11 on a kill by Kayleigh Giddens. Three straight points by Arizona would force an Aggie timeout trailing 14-11. The Aggies would cut the Wildcat lead to two points at 14-12 and 16-14 but a four point run by the Cats would give them a 20-14 lead. The Aggies would trail by five at 23-18 but the Wildcats would put the set away at 25-19. The Aggies would fall behind quickly 3-0 in the third set and would go down 9-5 after a kill by Arizona's Madeline Lozano. However, six straight Aggie points highlighted by three straight kills by Rocio Gutierrez would give the Aggies an 11-9 lead. The Aggies would hold a 12-11 lead as 5'8" Jennah DeVries would win a joust at the net over 6'3" Whitney Dosty. The Aggies would push their lead to three points at 16-13 after an attack error by Courtney Karst. The Aggies would still hold a two point lead at 19-17 after a kill by Desiree Scott but the Wildcats would tie the set after Rocio Gutierrez committed an attack error. The Aggies and Woldcats would trade points and the set would remain tied at 21-21 but two straight points by the Aggies would give them a 23-21 lead. Two points later the set would be tied at 23 forcing an Aggie timeout. Kayleigh Giddens would commit an attack error on the next point to give the Wildcats a 24-23 lead prompting another Aggie timeout. Whitney Woods would record a kill to tie the set at 24 but Arizona would finish off the match on kill by Tiffany Owens two points later to give the Wildcats a 26-24 set victory and send the Aggies home with their sixth straight defeat.
Kayleigh Giddens led the Aggies with 10 kills on 28 swings with six attack errors and hit .143 on the match. Desiree Scott had nine kills and committed no attack errors and hit .818 on the match. Fellow middle Michelle Kuester finished with four kills on eight swings with no attack errors and hit .500 for the match. "They've got talent and they're getting better, we've just got to keep feeding them the ball a little bit more as the opportunity arises," said Coach Jordan. "That comes with confidence. We understand that we can't just keep setting Kayleigh all the time and Woods all the time. With Kelsey Brennan out, we've got to prove our middles can get kills. They did a good job." Whitney Woods finished with seven kills, Rocio Gutierrez and setter Jennah DeVries each finished with five kills and freshman Deirdre Pajares recorded one kill.
Rocio Gutierrez finished with eight digs to lead the way for the Aggies. Kayleigh Giddens and Ellen Miks each had seven digs in the match. Tiffany Owens had a career night for the Wildcats with 22 kills, 12 digs and a service ace. Cursty Jackson finished with 10 kills on 13 swings and just one attack error to hit .692. Courtney Kars added 10 kills on 22 swings with three attack errors and hit .318. The Wildcats had seven service aces and seven service errors while the Aggies had two service aces and six service errors.
Arizona finished the match hitting .408 while the Aggies hit .312. The two teams combined for just 22 attack errors, 10 for Arizona and 12 for the Aggies. "It was very clean, it was an excellently played offensive match," said Coach Jordan. "They passed a little bit better serve receive than we did which helped them obviously. They're still big and physical and it's tough to stop them even when they're out of system. A lot of that big percentage came in the first game where we had a lot of defensive opportunities that we didn't make. I think if we can clean that up we'll be a lot tougher."
The Aggies open up WAC play on Thursday night when they face Louisiana Tech in Ruston, LA. at 6:00 p.m. MT.

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Massacre in Juarez Early Friday Morning

From the El Paso Times - JUAREZ -- At least seven people, including a woman in her 20s, were massacred early this morning in the Pronaf area, a bar strip in north Juárez, Chihuahua state police said. The shooting occurred about 4 a.m. inside the V-Bar and killed seven people and injured two others. Police have not identified the victims and did not confirm the conditions of the other two wounded. Read more here:
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Arnold and Bill versus Jan and Rick

From the El Paso Times -  U.S.-Mexico border governors will meet Sunday and Monday in Santa Fe to talk about border security and economic development even though Texas Gov. Rick Perry and Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer are boycotting the event, New Mexico officials said Friday. Brewer and Perry will not be there because they disagree with the decision of the other governors to move the conference from Arizona to New Mexico. The conference was supposed to be in Phoenix this year, but the six Mexican governors in the group announced in June that they would not travel to Arizona because of its new immigration law. At that point, Brewer canceled the conference. However, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson disagreed with Brewer and he moved the conference to New Mexico. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is helping Richardson host the conference.

Bill Richardson
Chihuahua state Gov. Jose Reyes Baeza is expected to be there. Richardson said the conference must go on regardless of who shows up."As border governors, we see the impact of border issues like security, economic development and energy issues every day," Richardson said in a statement. "While we may not always agree on every issue, as leaders of the U.S.-Mexico border region, we must maintain a strong dialogue to help assure cooperation along the border, resolve regional border issues, and make sure binational issues are given proper attention by our federal governments."
Jan Brewer
A spokeswoman for Perry said the Texas governor will not attend the meeting and referred all questions to the statements Perry made in July when the conference site was changed. "It was Arizona's turn to host this and he respected their decision to cancel it. He still intends to have a working relationship with all of the border governors," Perry spokeswoman Katherine Cesinger said. Read more here:
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Mallot Attempts Defense of "Loan"

Bruce Malott
From NMPolitics.net - Former Educational Retirement Board Chairman Bruce Malott takes issue with Republican gubernatorial candidate Susana Martinez’s characterization of the situation that led him to resign as a conflict of interest. Malott says no conflict existed because he was not aware that the son of a man who loaned him money was making millions of dollars in finder’s fees off deals with the retirement board (ERB). He says he took and passed a polygraph test to prove that he had no knowledge of the finder’s fees. Read more here:
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Just What We Need - More Law Professors in Power

Elizabeth Warren
If mobile phones can be used to buy gas and pay bills in the U.S., should they be subject to the same consumer protections as bank accounts or credit cards? Questions like this may be answered one day by a new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau being built in Washington. The agency’s $400 million budget and mandate to guard people from high fees, confusing contracts and “unfair, deceptive or abusive” practices have corporations and their critics wrestling over its jurisdiction and agenda, even before it gets a director or office space. In a Rose Garden ceremony today, President Barack Obama will name Harvard law professor Elizabeth Warren to lead a committee to establish the regulator. Uncertainty over the agency’s scope and demands by consumer advocates for rules in a variety of industries has companies bracing for unexpected battles. Read more here:
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Not Knowing is a Huge Negative

Concern that U.S. personal income taxes will increase next year caused an unexpected decline in consumer confidence in September, indicating the biggest part of the economy will struggle to pick up. The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary index of consumer sentiment dropped to a one-year low of 66.6, figures showed yesterday. The decrease was due entirely to a rise in pessimism was among households with incomes above $75,000, the group said.
A separate report from the Federal Reserve showed household wealth declined 2.8 percent in the second quarter as stock prices fell. While lawmakers have said they plan to extend the George W. Bush-era tax cuts for the middle class, they’re at odds about whether to continue them for wealthier Americans. The delay in achieving passage prompted declines in the higher income group’s views this month about personal finance, buying plans and prospects for the economy. “Just not knowing whether you’ll get hit with a big tax hike is a huge negative,” said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Inc., a consulting firm in Lexington, Massachusetts. “The delay and the uncertainty are dangerous.” Congress and the president “are playing with fire.” Read more here:


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Aggies and Miners - 88th Meeting

DeWayne Walker
Tonight's game between New Mexico State and UTEP is the 88th meeting between the two schools. This is the Aggies’ first rivalry game of the season with New Mexico to follow, Oct. 9. The game is scheduled for a 7 p.m. (MT) start at the Sun Bowl, Sept. 18. This season NM State is sitting at 0-1, 0-0 while the Miners are 1-1, 0-1 after beating Prairie View A&M in the season opener and a tough loss to conference rival Houston this past week.
The Aggies are 2-1 in the last three meetings in the series. The last meeting between the two schools in El Paso was back in 2008 when the Aggies beat the Miners, 34-33, earning their first win against the Miners in El Paso since 1994. Quarterback Chase Holbrook threw for 329 yards and five touchdowns, while Chris Williams caught seven passes for 119 yards and Marcus Anderson caught three touchdowns. Both teams racked up a combined 738 yards of total offense that game (366 – NM State and 372 – UTEP). The Miners and Aggies squared off for the first time in 1914, as NM State won 19-0. You can listen to all the action with the ‘Voice of the Aggies’ Jack Nixon and color analyst Jason Scott beginning at 6 p.m. on KGRT 104 FM. Also catch the action in Spanish with Martin Cortez and Bob Sherman on Vista 98.7 FM. Read more here:

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Mayfield Drops Another Heartbreaker 24-23 to Eldorado

There is nothing soft about the Mayfield Trojans pre-district schedule. Things were not any easier for MHS again last night at the Field of Dreams when Albuquerque Eldorado came to town. The 2010 Eldorado team is huge, physical, and talented. It was obvious even to the casual observer that Mayfield was much smaller though perhaps a bit faster. Both highly ranked football teams battled hard from the outset. When MHS kicker Brock Baca hit a 49 yard field goal late in the second quarter to give the Trojans a 17-6 lead at the half, few fans in the stands believed the game was over. The Eagles scored early in the third quarter and competed well in hostile territory. And despite having a great game throwing and running, in the end, a late game interception toss by Trojan quarterback Axten Franzoy proved costly. Eldorado took full advantage of the late game pick when quarterback Marcus Jaramillo hit John Russo down the middle with what turned out to be the game-winning touchdown. For Eldorado their biggest play came with just under four minutes to go. The Trojans came back with yet another impressive drive while trailing 24-23 after the Russo score. However, when the clock clicked down to six seconds, MHS had to burn its final time out with the ball resting on the Eldorado 26 yard line. From there, Brock Baca was faced with a 43 yard field goal to win the game. After a low snap was gathered and placed for Baca, he hit the ball well. But the kick was just wide to the left left and the Eagles had one of the rarest of all things in New Mexico high school football, a 24-23 win over Mayfield at the Field of Dreams.

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Cruces Beats Undefeated Hobbs 30-14

The Las Cruces Bulldawgs played far away from the Field of Dreams again last night. After going to Albuquerque last week, Jim Miller's undefeated team traveled all the way to the southeast corner of the state to take on a 3-0 Hobbs team. Hobbs is a squad that is loaded with talent. The game was greatly anticipated in a city better known for its basketball and oil fields and a huge crowd was on hand for the Mesilla Valley invaders. In the end, Las Cruces proved too deep, too skilled, and too talented on both sides of the ball. After Cruces opened with twenty-one first quarter points, the Dawgs improved to 4-0 on the season with a convincing 30-14 victory. Xavier Hall, who has been a primary weapon in the Cruces offensive machine, was sidelined with a knee injury and did not play. While his replacement, David Ferralez, gained 79 yards, it was LCHS quarterback Jeremey Buurma's night. Buurma accounted for 400 yards of total offense including 241 on the ground on 25 carries and 159 yards passing.

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Onate's Woes Continue 0-4 on the Year

The Oñate Knights fell behind early at Rio Rancho last night and never recovered. Shut out in the first half, the Knights gave up two first quarter touchdowns and a third TD in the second quarter. The Knights showed some signs of life with an impressive 97 yard drive in the third quarter to cut the Rams lead to 21-7, but Onate scored only once more time the rest of the way, while giving up two second half touchdowns to Rio Rancho. The Knights fell to 0-4 on the year and have been beaten badly in each game. OHS has now been outscored 177-37 on the season. Onate travels back to the Duke City one more time before their district season opens to play West Mesa. They also have Volcano Vista on the schedule.

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