Lady Tigers open title defense with gritty win over Madison College
Not done yet! After dropping its opening set against No. 11-seed Madison College (WI) on Wednesday at the NJCAA Division II Volleyball National Championships in Cedar Rapids, IA, the No. 6-seed Cowley College Lady Tigers bounced back to defeat the Wolfpack 19-25, 25-21, 25-15, 25-18.
Cowley, the back-to-back national champions, improves its record to 31-5 and advances to play third-seed Parkland College on Thursday at 7:30 p.m. Madison (33-5) falls into the consolation bracket.
Things started poorly for Cowley as they trailed 11-4 in the opening set. The Lady Tigers rallied to within one point (16-15) of the lead but were unable to come all the way back in the 25-19 defeat.
"Madison started aggressively with their block, and that helped them with their offense, which put us on our heels," Cowley head coach Steven Gream said. "We also started a little nervous, and that helped as well with Madison getting up to take set one."
Cowley appeared to be on its way to being down two sets to none as Madison led set two 17-12. However, the Tigers' serve helped bring them back as an ace by sophomore Ashlynn Jaccard tied the set at 20-20, and another ace by freshman Sabrina Scariot sealed the 25-21 victory.
"We relaxed more in set two, and that allowed us to get our offense going, and along with our serve, allowed us to really take control and put pressure on them, and that allowed our defense to do their job more and more as the match went along," Gream said.
After falling behind 4-1 to start set three, Cowley scored nine of the next 10 points and cruised to the 25-15 win.
Set four was again close to start, with the score tied at 6-6 before the Tigers scored 10 of the following 11 points and went on to the 25-18 win.
Freshman Lana Gomilanovic led three Cowley players in double figures in kills as she had a double-double, finishing with 12 kills and 13 digs. Teo Cekan (11 kills) and Josci Buckley (10 kills) also played well, while Hanna Darvas finished with 33 assists and eight of Cowley's 14 service aces.
Madison's Ella Vosberg led all players with 20 kills.
Cowley will now turn its attention to a Parkland squad that is 49-4 on the season. The Tigers defeated Parkland in five sets while taking part in the Heartland Community College Invitational on October 10.
"Parkland is a strong program that competes each year for a national championship," Gream said. "We played them earlier this year and won, but we know they will make adjustments, and we need to be ready. We got our first match under us and now need to use that momentum in this match."