Volleyball Qualifies for KCAC Tournament as No. 11 Seed
For the fifth straight season, Avila volleyball is one of the final conference teams standing: Avila has qualified for the 2023 KCAC Volleyball Tournament as the No. 11 seed, and will begin postseason play on Tuesday night.
Avila became part of the KCAC ahead of the 2018 season and missed the postseason field that year. But since then, the Eagles have been a staple of the KCAC postseason lineup, making the league tournament in each of the following five seasons, including all three now under head coach Marylyn Mozena. The KCAC allows 12 teams to make the postseason field in volleyball – compared to eight in sports like soccer and basketball – which makes it possible for more teams to qualify, sure, but even with the expanded field the Eagles have been playoff ever-presents, and this year's team will begin its quest for a postseason victory on Tuesday night.
And that game will take place in a familiar location: the Ashcroft Center in Springfield, Missouri, where the Eagles will face the KCAC's newest team, Evangel, for the second time in less than a week. The Valor defeated the Eagles in three sets last Wednesday in Springfield, and now the two in-state foes will meet up in Evangel's first KCAC Tournament match.
It's not exactly a dissimilar situation to last season for the Eagles, who closed out the regular season by facing Southwestern and then had to turn around and go back to Winfield and face the Moundbuilders again in the first round of the postseason less than a week later. The Eagles are hoping this rematch works out better than that one did, as the team searches for its first postseason victory since the marathon 2020-21 season when Avila defeated Friends at Mabee Fieldhouse the advance to the tournament quarterfinals for the first time as members of the KCAC.
The Eagles will enter the postseason on a three-game losing streak, including the aforementioned loss to Evangel, but Avila had already all but secured a postseason berth with its sweep of Friends on Senior Night in Mabee Fieldhouse on October 25. Aside from the Falcons, the Eagles have also defeated York and Bethany in league action this season, giving Avila three wins: one more than No. 12-seed Southwestern, and two more than York and Friends, locking up a spot in that Top 12 for the Purple and Gold.
This year's Eagle team is a young one – nearly all the featured players are in their first or second years of college volleyball – and, as such, the squad has experienced its ups and downs en route to a 7-19 overall record (3-10 KCAC). But clearly, some of the pieces are there for this team contend in the future in the KCAC, and perhaps even cause some havoc in the postseason this week.
The offense is led by freshman outside hitter Maddie Jones, who paces the team with 2.89 kills/set on .118 hitting. Fellow freshman Diamond Sedlak is second with 2.04 kills/set and is tied for the team lead with 20 service aces, and sophomore Sydney Owens has stepped into an elevated role in the offense recently, especially when Jones was sidelined with an injury.
It's rare for a freshman setter to be granted the keys to drive a college offense by themselves, but that's exactly what Mozena did with freshman setter Daphne Gardner, and she has more than lived up to the billing as the team's top setter option. The team has run a 1-setter rotation for almost the entire season as Gardner learns and grows, and she has finished the year strong, coming very close to a very rare triple-double against Friends. Abigail Blake took over the libero job as a freshman last year and has locked down that role all year this year, remarkably averaging exactly 5 digs/set as the team's top defender, likely en route to all-conference honors for the second year in a row.
It's a young team, but it certainly has some veteran presence: junior right-side Paige Huhman is in her first year with the team but has taken over the RS position down the stretch, and is now third on the team in kills/set at 1.70. Grad transfer middle Siobhan Dittmer has been the anchor at the net, leading the team with a .208 attack percentage and a strong 0.95 blocks/set clip. And the back row is led in part by the most veteran Eagle, fifth-year senior and third-year Eagle Kyleighn Block, who is third on the team in total digs.
Evangel was the big enigma coming into this season as the newest members of the KCAC, but with a league record of 8-5 and the No. 6 seed in their first go, it's safe to say it's been more good than bad for the Valor in their first season in a new league. The KCAC's two Missouri squads will face off for the second time in six days on Tuesday night at 7 PM in Springfield; the winner advances to face No. 3-seeded Bethel in the quarterfinals at Hutchinson Sports Arena on Friday afternoon.
The three other first round games will take place at host sites across the conference all night Tuesday. You can watch all the postseason action live and for free courtesy of the KCAC Network, and tune in to live coverage across our social media channels.
