KEARNEY, Neb. – Midwestern State was unable to sustain its fast start Friday afternoon at the NCAA Division II Southwest Region Tournament at the University of Nebraska-Kearney's Sports and Health Center.

The Mustangs claimed a 30-25 win in the opening game before No. 10 West Texas A&M rattled off victories of 30-24, 30-15 and 30-26 to advance to Saturday's second round.

The Lady Buffs (33-7) face Metropolitan State (Colo.), a 30-25, 32-30, 30-22 winner over Colorado-Colorado Springs, at 5 p.m.

"I'm proud of the girls for making it to regionals," MSU coach Venera Flores-Stafford said. "Ever team starts the season with the goal of making it here and only 64 can."

The Mustangs' best season in school history ends at 27-6.

Midwestern State used a 17-5 run to take a 27-15 Game 1 lead before holding off a 10-3 West Texas A&M rally to claim the early advantage with a 30-25 win in Game 1.

"We started the way we played all year," Flores-Stafford said. "We showed the focus and intensity we'd had all year long."

The Lady Buffs charged out to an 8-3 lead in Game 2 and maintained an advantage throughout the game as Midwestern was able to climb to within 22-20 after Jessica Ransom capped a 4-0 run with kill to force a West Texas A&M timeout.

The Lady Buffs recovered with a 4-1 run and claimed a 30-24 win to even the match at 1-1.

West Texas A&M blistered the Mustangs by hitting .432 as a team in the third game making 17 kills and one error on its way to a 30-15 win to take a 2-1 advantage.

The Mustangs recovered in a hard-fought fourth game, but the Lady Buffs claimed five of the last six points to close the match 30-26.

"We couldn't recover from the losses in the middle two games," Flores-Stafford said. "I'm proud of the girls for the way they came back. We played well today."

Ransom, a junior outside hitter from Wichita Falls, paced three Mustangs in double-figure kills with 15.

Senior outside hitter Krissa Johnson added 11 and junior right side hitter Whitney Maxwell had 10.

Sophomore middle blocker Sesley Graves paced a nine total team block day with seven, including a pair of solo blocks, while Maxwell added four stuffs.

Junior setter Allison Schreiber paced the offense with 43 set assists, while junior libero Shay Velasquez led the defense with 20 digs.

Notables

- Senior outside hitter Krissa Johnson became the fifth member of the 1,000-kill Club at Midwestern State with her 11 kills Friday against West Texas A&M. The Denver City, Texas product finishes her career with 1,009 kills. She is also sixth on MSU's all-time kills-per-game chart at 3.16.

- Junior libero Shay Velasquez became the school's all-time digs leader in Friday's loss to West Texas A&M. Velasquez, who led MSU with 20 digs against the Lady Buffs, passed Joni Martin, who had 1,599 from 2000-03. Velasquez now has 1,612 digs with a season remaining.

- Senior outside hitter Rachel Gilmore closed her career by playing in 126 matches which is the third most in school history trailing Kate Pence (134, 2002-05) and Joni Martin (127, 2000-03).

- Junior setter Allison Schreiber set the new school standard with 12.34 assists per game this season surpassing her old mark of 12.21 set as a freshman in 2005. Schreiber's 1,481 total assists this season was the second-most in school history. She had 1,624 in 2005. Schreiber is the school's all-time assists leader and will go into her senior year with 4,409.

- Velasquez also raised the MSU single-season standard for digs in a season on Friday as she bettered her mark of 572 digs last season to 589 in 2007. She needed six less games to accomplish the feat.

- Midwestern State was making its first appearance in the NCAA Division II national tournament since it joined the organization prior to the 1996 season. MSU's last national tournament appearance came the year before when it advanced to the NAIA District 8 title match. Midwestern had eight showings in the district tournament between 1988 and 1995 and claimed three district championships (1988, 1989, 1990).