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Pitt State volleyball finished off an impressive non-conference run with an undefeated weekend at the GAC-MIAA crossover in Oklahoma. The four wins boosted the Gorillas to an impressive 11-2 record as the team looks ahead to the start of conference play this weekend.
“Well I just think it helps boost our confidence again, it makes us still have that drive and that energy to keep going,” said Jen Gomez, head coach.
Pitt State entered the tournament losers of their previous two matches after starting the season undefeated.
Action started Friday morning in Edmond, Oklahoma, with a three sets to one victory over Southern Nazarene (26-24, 25-22, 18-25, 25-17). Sophomore Emily Regier and her older sister senior Lauren Regier both stood out in the opener with double digit kills and a pair of blocks each.
“I think Lauren Regier stepped up and Emily Regier, the middle blocker, she really came on strong blocking throughout the weekend,” Gomez said.
The Gorillas went on the defeat Northwestern Oklahoma, who beat Pitt last Saturday in four sets (22-25, 25-22, 25-13, 25-20). Freshman Morgan Henning led the team in in kills with 11 while contributing a pair of blocks and an ace. Lauren Regier came up big as well with 10 kills, four blocks, and a couple aces. Sophomore setter Camryn Blanton also played well with 39 assists and eight digs.
Day two in Shawnee, Oklahoma, saw Pitt face off with host Oklahoma Baptist in the opener (25-22, 20-25, 25-16, 25-23). Lauren Regier once again lead the team in kills with 15. Coach Gomez was also quick to shower praise on the performances in the backline.
“I thought Lauren Dunn and Lauren Maisberger really did some amazing things in the back row as far as serving, took the other teams out of there games, so I was really impressed with those kids,” Gomez said.
In he final game of the weekend the Gorillas defeated the East Central University Tigers in their most dominant performance of the tournament (25-11, 25-14, 23-25, 25-13). The club was lead in kills by freshman Hope White with her 14 successful spikes. Emily Regier also had her best game of the weekend with 13 kills and and 10 blocks.
With the preseason out of the way the Gorillas now set their sites on conference play with three straight games at home, starting Friday with Missouri Southern.
“I think it’s a definite advantage to open up conference at home, we feel that having that momentum behind us and then getting to be in front of our home crowd, that’ll be fun,” Gomez said. “I don’t think any of the games are easy, so we have to be prepared and be ready to go, but it’s just a nice advantage to be at home.”
Pitt tied for ninth place out of 12 teams in the preseason coaches poll and are using that as motivation as they go into league.
“I told them, ‘ I don’t care if they pick us dead last,’ I hope they do because we wanted our kids to go in and have something to prove,” Gomez said. “I think that’s kinda where we’re at right now ya know they’re not just gonna stop and be OK with the status quo and we’re not gonna play like a number nine team, we want to be in the top eight and we want to play in the conference tournament and those are our goals this year.”
That goal stats at 6 p.m. Friday against Missouri Southern, with following games Saturday at 2 p.m. against SBU and next Tuesday at 6 p.m. against UCO all at John Lance Arena.
