HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – It was the first Great American Conference Tournament Championship appearance for both Southern Arkansas and Southwestern Oklahoma St. on Saturday afternoon as a frantic pace by both teams developed early on, and the Lady Muleriders nearly forced a decisive fifth set as they fell in four sets (20-25, 19-25, 25-19, 24-26) to conclude tournament play.
 
The opening set inside a lively Bank of the Ozarks Arena saw only two ties and a pair of lead changes as Southwestern Oklahoma St controlled the frame after establishing a 15-10 lead. Southern Arkansas was unable to break through offensively in set one as the Bulldogs forced eight SAU attack errors and collected five blocks in holding the Lady Muleriders to a .068 hitting percentage to take a 1-0 match lead with a 25-20 set win.
 
It was more of the same from SWOSU in the second set as they pushed their block total to nine and held Southern Arkansas to an attack percentage of .044.
 
However, the Lady Muleriders would find balance offensively in the third set as they broke a 13-13 tie with a 6-2 run, before the Bulldogs battled back to pull within a point, 20-19. Senior middle hitter Emilie Aase delivered with a trio of kills that pushed SAU to set point before junior outside hitter Serena LeDuff forced a fourth set with a kill to give Southern Arkansas a 25-19 win. In that third set, SAU attacked at a mark of .244 while producing 17 kills.
 
The fourth set featured 13 ties and six lead changes as back and forth action put SWOSU out front 13-10. Southern Arkansas would refuse to go down without a fight as an ensuing 4-0 run eventually led to a 17-17 tie. After a SWOSU kill, the Lady Muleriders engineered a spirited 5-0 run that put them in control, up 22-18, highlighted by a pair of powerful kills from senior opposite hitter Shelby Lauterbach,
 
In what would turn out to be Southwestern Oklahoma's year, a 5-0 run shifted the momentum before kills from Lauterbach and LeDuff tied the match at 23-23 and 24-24 respectively, before SWOSU took the fourth set and the match on a pair of ensuing kills.
 
Aase, Lauterbach and LeDuff combined for 46 kills, led by LeDuff's 18. Lauterbach's 17 kills came at a swing clip of.298. Six Lady Muleriders recorded eight or more digs, led by four players in double figures highlighted by junior defensive specialists Hannah Rice's 30 and Paige Mays' 16.
 
Senior setter Taylor Reaume's fifteenth double-double of the year came with a game-high 44 assists and 13 digs.
 
LeDuff and Rice garnered All-Tournament selections for their performances over the three-day stretch that saw the Lady Muleriders take down Harding for the third time in 2015, topple top-seeded Arkansas Tech and fall just shy of the program's first GAC Tournament Championship.
 
Southern Arkansas finishes the season at 20-14 after becoming the first team in program history to reach the GAC Tournament Championship match.