It was 14-13 in NC State's favor in the fifth set after dropping the second and third sets. The Wolfpack had come back to barely claim the fourth set 25-22 and looked to take the match holding serve. Senior opposite hitter Amanda Rice was at the baseline and with the chance to ice the game when the Pack committed three errors in a row.
A 14-13 lead quickly evaporated into a 3-2 defeat with two consecutive attack errors crushing NC State volleyball's (5-3) hopes of a come-from-behind victory against Coastal Carolina (4-7).
"We were just lacking in energy at times, but I know we really turned it around in the fourth set and the fifth set was there," Rice said. "It's just unfortunate the way that it happened."
A common theme over the past few matches for the Pack has been slow starts. In each of the first three sets the Pack went down four, five and seven points respectively within the first 20 points of the set.
"I don't know what it is between the first and second set," Rice said. "Maybe we get too comfortable or just know we're the better team and we're hoping things just carry over, but it doesn't work like that."
"We can't just keep saying that we're fighting for energy the entire time because good Division I programs don't do that, and that's where we want to be," Rice said.
"I'm really proud of how resilient we were," Rice said. "I wish we had capitalized on that a little earlier."
"I'm glad that we had a bit of a wake-up call," Rice said. "ACC play is a lot more elevated and especially when we play Stanford and Cal on our second opening weekend. I hope we're ready for facing some kind of thing where we have to go at the jump if we're expecting to win."
The Wolfpack kickstarts ACC play at home against Virginia Tech on Friday at 7 p.m.
https://www.technicianonline.com/sports/wolfpack-volleyball-falls-3-2-to-coastal-carolina-in-heartbreaking-defeat/article_d87f7ada-79a6-11ef-9daf-83615ec54236.html 
