STEPHENVILLE, Texas - Midwestern State recovered from a brutal start Friday afternoon in the TexAnn Invitational at the Tarleton Rec Center.

But the Mustangs were unable to finish off the comeback falling to Southwest Baptist 25-9, 19-25, 23-25, 27-15, 16-14 to fall to 2-4 on the season.

MSU closes the invitational Saturday with matches against Texas-Permian Basin and St. Mary's (Texas) at 9:30 a.m. and 1 p.m.

The Mustangs could do no right on the attack in the first set as Southwest Baptist forced them into eight errors and a negative hitting percentage as MSU notched just seven kills in 32 total attack as the Bearcats went a set up.

MSU flexed its offensive might in the second set committing just a single error while clubbing 13 kills and hitting .444 to even the match with a 25-19 set win.

Then it was defense in the third set as the Mustangs frustrated SBU into nine errors and a .083 hitting percentage to move ahead two sets to one.

MSU battled its way to two set points in the fourth, but SBU's Kylie Heim's consecutive kills kept the Bearcats in the match before Alyx Grover's service ace and a kill by Ashley Jurgensmeyer allowed Southwest Baptist to force a fifth set.

The Mustangs pushed away two SBU match points in the fifth with kills from Shelbi Stewart and Hillary White before the Bearcats put away the match with help of a blocking error and another Jurgensmeyer kill to improve to 3-2 on the season.

White paced the MSU attack with 16 kills while committing just three errors for a .310 hitting percentage, but completed an all-around match with eight digs and four blocks.

Junior middle blocker Miranda Byrd added 14 kills and hit .345 while contributed five total blocks at the net.

Sophomore outside hitter Shelbi Stewart paced back row efforts with 14 digs, while junior libero Kiara Jordan added 12.

Jurgensmeyer paced Southwest Baptist with 18 kills and hit .412, while Joanna Granzow had 13 kills with a .478 hitting percentage.