SAN MARCOS -- The Iola Lady Bulldogs had come too far to allow two players to beat them.

Kopperl's sister duo of Jordan Smith, who was playing with a stomach bug, and Reagan Smith pounded away at the smaller Lady Bulldogs for a combined 33 kills, but the Iola hitters found ways around Kopperl's big front line for a 25-18, 13-25, 18-25, 25-14, 15-8 victory in the Class A state semifinals Friday at Strahan Coliseum.

"We knew coming in that those two big girls were going to hammer us and they were going to block everything we hit," said Iola coach Jamie McDougald. "But we saw a weakness in their serve receive, and that's one of our strengths. We knew if we could just withstand the beating those two girls were going to give us and we could serve, that we were going to be in the game."

Iola, making its second straight appearance in the state tournament, will play for the school's first state championship at 9 a.m. Saturday against Windthorst, which also gutted out a five-game victory -- 17-15 in the deciding game -- over Flatonia.

Using a balanced offense, Iola had 53 kills -- seven more than Kopperl -- while also serving tough, recording 13 aces and keeping the Lady Eagles from consistently getting into their offense.

"We're little, but we work hard," said Iola's Hannah Pointer, who had 10 kills. "We all have to do our jobs individually, and that's what we do. When we get good passes, we just think 'don't waste it. Hit it as hard as you can.'"

Shelby Bishop led Iola with 18 kills, while Mercedes Alafa, who came alive in Games 4 and 5, added 14. Ashley Brown had a big day at the service line with eight aces.

"Their block never bothered me," Alafa said of Kopperl's tall front line. "I've learned to hit around it. Being a hitter, you have to learn to deal with bigger girls [across the net]."

Kopperl, in its first state tournament appearance, came out sluggish, and Iola pounced immediately with an Alafa ace on the first point. That set the tone for Game 1, as the Lady Bulldogs ran out to an early 10-3 lead and never looked back.

Early in Game 2, Reagan Smith had her first emphatic kill of the match, and that woke up the Lady Eagles, who finally began to use their size advantage and fired away. Behind Reagan Smith's seven kills and two blocks, the Lady Eagles hit .370 in Game 2 and evened the match at 1-1.

Kopperl continued to fire away in Game 3, and the Lady Eagles never trailed en route to a 2-1 lead in the match.

"I definitely felt better after Game 3, and I thought if we could take that fourth one, with Jordan being sick, we'd be OK," Kopperl coach Trava Smith said. "I knew if we went to five we weren't going to make it. [Jordan's] our big gun, normally 25 kills a game. She had 18 today, and that's a big difference."

In Game 4, the Lady Eagle offense that had stunned Iola in Games 2 and 3 reverted back to its Game 1 form, and the 5-foot-7 Alafa found ways to get shots around the big Kopperl block for five kills, pacing the Iola offense to help even the match and force a deciding Game 5.

"The difference between the second and third games and the fourth and fifth games is that in the second and third games we weren't hitting," said Iola libero Kelseigh Braaton. "We know from experience that we're good if we hit and we're not if we don't. We realized in the fourth game that we were going to have to hit the ball, or it wasn't going to work."

It was the first time Iola had been in a fifth game this season, but it didn't seem to both the Lady Bulldogs, as they scored four of the first five points on two kills by Bishop and a pair of Kopperl errors.

"Kopperl had a five-game match coming out of regionals, and we hadn't," McDougald said. "I knew if we could just hit the ball, we'd be fine. I told them we're even-Steven, and I told them to go in with the enthusiasm they came out of the locker room with, and they did."

Three consecutive Reagan Smith kills evened the final game at 4, but Pointer broke the tie with a kill and back-to-back aces from Ashley Brown put the Lady Bulldogs in the driver's seat.

Down the stretch, the smiles on the Lady Bulldogs' faces said it all, and when Braaton's shot on match point couldn't be handled by Kopperl -- it was Braaton's only kill of the match -- Iola's celebration began.

"I almost broke down in tears," Braaton said. "I was just thinking 'That was it. We're going [to the championship match].'"