Archive for the ‘Volleyball’ Category

The Griffon Volleyball team wins their first home game this season against Nebraska-Omaha in a hard fought five-match game Friday Night. Nebraska-Omaha won the first two matches, 30-28 and 33-31. Western would rally winning the next three matches 30-28, 27-25, 15-13.

The Griffons would rack up 82 kills, 23 of them coming from Meghan Voles. Kelli Sicner had 18 kills as well. Britny Pearl had 24 digs and 1 kill. Most of these numbers are at least double what the Griffon Volleyball team got against their last opponent, Missouri Southern on October 31st.

The Griffon volleyball team gave a valiant effort, Friday, Oct. 23, but was overpowered by the seventh ranked team in the nation, the Emporia State Hornets, by a score of 25-19 in three straight sets.

This was a very unusual occurrence. Head coach Cory Frederick said he had never seen a game like this before.

Frederick said Emporia is a very tough team to compete against because of their discipline. They were champions of the MIAA last season and ranked as high as number three in the nation but lost to number nine Central Missouri and dropped to number seven.

“Emporia is a very good team,” Frederick said. “They don’t make a lot of mistakes.”

There were a few highlights for the Griffons as Kelly Sicner and Hannah Zimmerman led the team with ten kills each. Madison Benton also had a great game with 31 assists.

Sicner leads the team with 314 kills for the season. She is a strong force on the net.

“We could have improved on coverage and hitting,” Sicner said. “We just didn’t do it.”

Western made several runs at the Hornets but could never quite over take them. Zimmerman, who is third on the team in kills with 169, said with a little improvement they could have competed with a team of this caliber.

“We need to work on our mental game; it is just as important as our serves,” Zimmerman said.

There are several things that are in need of improvement, especially blocking.

“It is very important to have set block, it is the whole key to our defense,” Zimmerman said.

Frederick thought they didn’t execute very well but still has high hopes for the team and said he has seen great improvement over last season.

“They just need to play better as a group; we need to work better as a whole,” Frederick said.

The game might not have been a win, but over $700 was raised during Pink Out night in support of breast cancer awareness. There was also a large, enthusiastic crowd and was the second most attended home game with 247 fans.

The next night another ranked team rolled into the Looney Complex. The number nine Washburn Lady Blues defeated the Griffons in three sets, 25-13, 25-20, and 25-18.

Missouri Western ended the week with an 8-18 overall record and 1- 12 MIAA. The next opponent for the Griffons is Pittsburg State at home on Oct. 28, at 7:00 p.m.

The Missouri Western Griffons volleyball team lost to the Truman State Bulldogs, 3-1 (16-25, 26-24, 25-18, and 25-15) last Saturday.

Missouri Western played well: managing to take one game from the nationally ranked Bulldogs. The achilles heel of the Griffons has been that they play a great initial game, losing by a very slim margin, and then get blown out in the following game. Fortunately, it would appear that the Griffons are fixing this problem.

Western beat Northwest Missouri State 3-2 on Wednesday, and then Saturday they played a solid game against a tough Truman squad, giving the team a badly needed boost.

“It was nice to see the team lose a game they should have won (at Northwest), but rather than get discouraged, continue to play and win the match,” head coach Cory Frederick said. “They didn’t roll over for us, we won – and I think it helps for the team to know that.”

The Griffons have also made strides to fix the simple mistakes that cause them to give up easy points. They are also creating and earning points rather than waiting for the opposing team to make mistakes.

“We have a healthy balance; we’re creating more kills now than we have all season, and it’s led to better passing,” Frederick said. “If we continue to play this way, I think the team will be very happy with the results.”

Coach Frederick is happy with how the team has been playing lately.

“The team has turned over a couple of new leaves this week,” Frederick said. “Truman was obviously a very tough match for us, but we played very well. If we continue to play the same way we did at Truman, we’re going to find more wins later this season. So far we haven’t competed well with nationally ranked teams, but we definitely changed that against Truman.”

Outside Hitter Kelli Sicner agreed.

“Truman is a strong and consistent team,” Sicner said. “The games were close, and we took the second game from them. We played well, but Truman was consistent and their defense is great. We played well against a good team.”

The stat board was well balanced for the Griffons against Truman. Leading Western with 13 kills was Meghan Voelz, followed closely by Kelli Sicner with 10. Madison Benton had 40 set assists and 16 digs, along with Britny Pearl, who had 16 digs. Britny Pearl has also given life to the Griffons on the court in another way.

“We don’t have anyone who’s a leader type, but Britny Pearl has had great games and great practices this week,” Frederick said. “We all try to cheer each other on, so when one of us works hard, we all work hard.”

Missouri Western’s record after Truman comes to 8-15 overall and 1-9 in MIAA conference play, while the Bulldogs improved to 18-8 and 6-4 in the MIAA. Western’s next game will be played at home on Friday, Oct. 23 at 7:00 p.m. The game is against last year’s MIAA champions: the 8th ranked Emporia State Hornets.

The Griffon Volleyball team lost to 4th ranked Central Missouri last Saturday 0-3.

The Griffons went down early in the first game 0-5, but managed to make a great run to battle back to 9-6. Unfortunately, Central Missouri showed why they are ranked 4th in the nation; they did not become discouraged and continued to play at a consistently high level.

Eventually, the Griffons became overwhelmed and only scored three more points during the first game, making the score 12-25. The second game was much closer than the first, with the Griffons playing on par physically with Central Missouri. Finally, the last game was oddly reminiscent of the first with the Griffons playing hard and trying, but the Jennies were just too much for the squad. The third game’s final score was 13-25.

While the score doesn’t show it, the Griffons played a good and solid game against Central Missouri with a few too many mistakes.

“We played really well Saturday; coach said it was our best game for the week,” outside hitter Kelli Sicner said. “We need to focus more though. That’s our biggest problem.”

Junior outside hitter Meghan Voelz agreed.

“We played a lot better than normal,” Voelz said. “We played to our competition. Although I think if we can fix how we play when we’re down, we could be a lot better.”

The Griffons biggest problem this year is the mental mistakes they make on the floor that gives other teams free points, according to head coach Cory Frederick. Unfortunately, they played Central Missouri, a team that makes very few mistakes at all.

“The match against Central Missouri was a difficult match,” Frederick said. “They are a solid team that does not make mistakes. In the first game, we had scored only 12 points and out of those almost 90 percent we had to score ourselves. Central just doesn’t make any mistakes. We just made too many mistakes without question.”

The Griffons mental mistakes or lapses have taken their toll on the team this season. Frederick had implemented ‘focus’ drills into practice to try and fix the problem.

“I think our biggest problem right now is making mistakes on the offensive side of the ball,” Frederick said. “We hit a season low -.018 against Central Missouri and there is no excuse for that. We have to eliminate those mistakes, and it seems to be more mental than physical. Outside of volleyball I have instituted some drills that don’t have to do with volleyball so that they understand what we have to deal with, but it’s a hard thing to address and hopefully it will translate into fewer mistakes.”

The stat leaders for the night were Hannah Zimmerman with seven kills and Kelli Sicner with six kills. Madison Benton marked 22 assists and Meghan Voelz had two service aces.

The Griffon’s next two home games will be Friday, Oct. 23, and Saturday, Oct. 24, both beginning at 7:00 p.m.