Tournament Homepage |
Tournament Bracket
EAST PEORIA, Ill. – In the final round of the 2017 Great Lakes Valley Conference Volleyball Championship Tournament, No. 1 seed Lewis University beat No. 3 seed Rockhurst University, 3-2 (22-25, 25-27, 25-19, 25-19, 15-8), on Sunday, Nov. 19 at the EastSide Centre in East Peoria, Ill., to extend its Conference-best postseason 10th league title.
The win didn’t come easy for Lewis, however, as Rockhurst showed up big in the first two sets to take a 2-0 lead into the intermission. In the first set, the Hawks grabbed the first two points and never looked back. They had an initial 6-1 advantage early on and another lead at 14-8 before Lewis scored eight of the next 10 points to tie things at 16-all. Rockhurst called a timeout and returned to the court to take control at 20-17, which it was able to maintain until picking up the 25-27 win. The second set began with the first two points going in Lewis’ favor, a lead it was able to maintain until the very end of the set when Rockhurst drew things even at 24-24. The Flyers went ahead 25-24, but it was the Hawks that scored the final three points to earn the 27-25 win.
Third-ranked Lewis was not ready to go without a fight, as they returned from the locker room with a vengeance. Earning the first point of the set and taking an 18-9 lead later in the set, followed by another 21-10 advantage, Rockhurst mustered an eight-point run to get within four points at 22-18. It was the Flyers, though, that scored the final three points of the set to inch closer with a 2-1 match score. In the fourth set it was again Lewis that score the first two points, going up 5-1 before Rockhurst tied the match at 6. The Hawks took their first lead at 8-7 and again at 12-11, but the Flyers went ahead again 14-13 and never looked back.
In the deciding set, despite allowing Rockhurst to tie the match three times in the early going, Lewis never trailed en route to its decisive 15-8, fifth-set victory.
Lewis’ Aly Schneider notched a match- and season-high 20 kills on .432 hitting and added a season-high eight blocks, while Ronni Katarzynski collected a match-high 27 digs. Additionally, Bailey Sparkman (13 kills, 16 digs), Abby Becker (match-high 57 assists, 12 digs) and Maddie Seliga (12 kills, 13 digs) aided the Flyers on both offense and defense with their double-doubles. On the flip side, three Hawks also turned in double-double efforts, including Grace Carter, Dani Prusha and Alyssa Woodman. Carter recorded a team-high 34 assists and 15 digs, Prusha had 20 assists with 10 digs, while Woodman went for 13 kills and 16 digs. Karli Reichert (17 kills) and Anne Hellwege (24 digs) also recorded team-highs for the Hawks.
With the victory, Lewis becomes the fifth team to win in five sets – based on available league history – and the first since 2014 to come back from two sets down for the win (Truman State University did so in 2014). The Flyers have now won two tournament titles in the last three years to earn the Conference's automatic bid to the NCAA Division II Women's Volleyball Tournament. They will learn their opponent tomorrow night when the Selection Show airs live on
NCAA.com at 7:30 p.m. Eastern Time. Additionally, the win secures Lewis' 12th-straight NCAA Tournament berth, which is the longest streak for any volleyball team in the Midwest Region and the longest streak of consecutive NCAA berths for any Lewis program in department history.
All seven matches of the GLVC Volleyball Championship Tournament can be replayed on the GLVC Sports Network by clicking the "On Demand" tab at
GLVCSN.com.