Tulane Outlasts Roadrunners to Win 3-2

Friday, October 31

New Orleans, LA

6:30 p.m.

Tulane University

10-12,2-9American

UTSA

11-11,4-7American

UTSA

Tulane

Oct 31, 2025 | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

NEW ORLEANS – In a fierce Halloween battle in Uptown Tulane volleyball (10-12, 2-9) snapped its eight-match skid with a 3-2 victory over UTSA (11-11, 4-7) on Friday night inside Avron B. Fogelman Arena in the Devlin Fieldhouse. The duo of Avery Burks and Ava Derbes helped lead the Green Wave to the five-set victory combining for 38 kills in the match.

With the win, the Wave improved to 8-4 at home on the season while the Roadrunners fell to 3-5 in road matches.

Burks had the highlight of the evening as she eclipsed 1,000 kills in her Tulane career. The 1,000th kill came on the winning point of the second set for the Wave. She finished the night with a team-high 20 kills to go with 17 digs marking her 20th match of the season with double-digit kills and her 14th with a double-double.

Derbes followed with a career night offensively tallying a career-high 18 kills and 19.0 total points. The performance marked the sixth time this year the senior has recorded double figures in kills. Lauryn Mack rounded out the top performers offensively for the Wave with her 10th match in double figures with 13 kills.

Junio Zoe Rachow came up one shy of her career best as she set up the offense for the Green Wave recording 48 assists against UTSA. This marks her third-straight match with at least 30 kills and her 10th this season. She also added 16 digs, three kills, and a pair of blocks for good measure.

Defensively, Dayla Ortiz led Tulane with 23 digs which marks her second in a row with at least 20 digs and her sixth this year. Ortiz also reached 100 assists in her Green Wave career as she added eight on Friday night.
A first set that saw four ties and three lead changes eventually went the way of the Roadrunners as the Wave fell 19-25.

Tulane answered in the second set taking control early with a 10-3 run to claim a 12-5 advantage. The Green Wave never looked back leading by as many as nine points before taking the set 25-16.

The Wave continued to put the pressure on the Roadrunners in a back-and-forth third set. The two teams exchanged the lead three times and met in a tie four time until Tulane rattled off three-straight points to take an 11-8 lead. Eventually, the Green Wave finished off the set with a 25-20 win to take a 2-1 lead in the match.

UTSA did not go away without a fight, however, jumping in front early in the fourth set. Tulane kept the set tight for a while until the Roadrunners scored five unanswered to put the Wave down six before ultimately dropping the set 17-25.

The fifth and final set was another highly contested battled as Tulane and UTSA exchanged the lead three more times and squared off in a tie six times. The Green Wave made the final push breaking a 15-15 tie with back-to-back kills from Rachow and Mack to win the set 17-15 and secure the match 3-2.

UP NEXT
The Green Wave will square off with UAB in Uptown on Sunday, November 2. The match between the Green Wave and the Blazers is scheduled for 1 p.m. on Sunday.

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Tickets can be purchased by calling 504-861-WAVE (9283), logging on to TulaneTix.com or visiting the ticket office at the James W. Wilson Jr. Center.

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