The Earlham Invitational provided the perfect venue for the women's volleyball team to test their pre-season training. The four senior captains, Anne Goodrich-Stuart, Teddye Shaffer, Hannah Richards, and Katie Duntley have done a great job setting the foundation of hard work in our practice gym, and showed great gamesmanship at the opening tourney this weekend as well.
Richards and Goodrich-Stuart hit a majority of the balls, mixing it up between shots to frustrate the opponents defense , and their KA-BOOM hits. Shaffer was unremitting at the Libero position, picking up a total of 66 digs for the tourney, and Duntley provided a bold presence at the net hitting fast tempo balls and putting up big blocks all day long!
After a 2-0 start on Friday, the Panthers took the court against Goshen University (a NAIA scholarship school). The Panthers sputtered through the match, trying to find their rhythm, but never quite did. There were bright spots and mini come backs, but not nearly enough ball control to win. Anne Goodrich-Stuart put down 15 kills, hitting .314, and Richards scored another double-double with 10 kills and 11 digs. Catherine Speer and Hillary Moser came off the bench adding some much needed energy and freshness. It was enough to take a game, but not the match.
In the last match of the tourney, Prin put it all together again. The passing and serving were back, and those two skills set the stage for great things to happen. The team only had 12% error offensively and hit .232 as a team , while serving 92% as a group with 7 aces, 3 of them from Isabelle Tetu. Freshman Sarah Howard was bold at the net tallying 4 blocks.
Overall, the Panthers competed well, and showed marked improvement since last week's scrimmage. Anne Goodrich-Stuart had a stellar weekend hitting and passing, as well as from the service line. Sophomore setter Tara Edwards earned the “Coaches” award for the weekend, showing great skill and leadership in running the offense. Tara served tough, was scrappy defensively, and delivered the ball to our hitters from all over the court. Tara dished up 117 assists for the weekend.
The Panthers look forward to another week of work before competing at the Rhodes Invitational in Memphis next weekend.
