WEST PLAINS, Mo. – The Missouri State University-West Plains Grizzly Volleyball team closed out its regular season Thursday afternoon with a 1-3 loss at No. 5 Iowa Western Community College in Council Bluffs.
The scores were 16-25, 14-25, 26-24, 24-26. The loss drops the No. 16 Grizzlies’ record to 13-5 as they head into postseason action.
The Grizzlies went into the contest after a hard-fought, five-set win over Mineral Area College (MAC) Tuesday evening.
“We were definitely coming off a big win, but instead of riding that momentum, we relaxed a little bit too much,” Grizzly Volleyball Head Coach Paula Wiedemann said. “You cannot get on the court with the No. 5 team in the country and not come out fighting from the beginning.
“It’s hard to find that balance when we put so much focus on a big game, get the win and stop to enjoy it a little, when we have another big game right around the corner against an opponent who doesn’t care what you just did,” she added.
“Basically, we were spectators for the first two sets before we started playing like we have been the last few weeks,” Wiedemann said. “I’m not taking anything away from Iowa Western. They came out just like I thought they would. We just didn’t match it.”
The Grizzlies finally turned things around in the third set and played with the same intensity they showed Tuesday evening against MAC. They carried that level of play into the fourth set but came up short.
“If we would have started the game with that intensity and played like we have been, then all of the pressure would have been on them. But when we are down 0-2 to start, it kept the pressure on us,” Wiedemann said.
“It was great seeing the fight we played with, it just didn’t happen soon enough,” she added. “It’s frustrating because I really liked the way we played in the third and fourth sets. We did some great things, and instead of really feeling good about it, it felt more like a big, missed opportunity. If we handle this the right way, we can get better because of it. Lessons learned during the season are so valuable at the end.”
Those missed opportunities included chances to create transition points off defense early in the contest, Wiedemann said.
“Once we were playing instead of watching, it was anyone’s game,” she said. “We picked it up on blocking and defense and gave ourselves opportunities we didn’t create in the first two sets. All our blocking, except for one double block, came in the third and fourth sets. We were earning 5 points a set in the last two sets off our blocking.
“We also had several ‘zero’ dig attempts that could have resulted in opportunities to earn points or force them to have to take care of the ball again and again,” the coach added. “When teams get impatient with having to play through long points, they start forcing things, and you see them make more errors.
“We had a lot of good things going our way, but when you start the way we did, it is a frustrating feeling walking away with that loss,” Wiedemann said.
For the game, the Grizzlies were paced offensively by sophomore outside hitter Maju Loureiro and freshman outside hitter Imani Nicholson, both of whom had 11 kills. Freshman middle blocker Manuela Bibinbe added 10.
Sophomore setter Julieta Campana had a team-leading 24 assists, while Nicholson led the team in passing rating with 2.75.
Defensively, sophomore middle blocker Nayla Watkins led the team in blocking with four, and freshman libero Lauren Weber had a team-leading 27 digs. Nicholson also had 13.5 points earned.
Wiedemann believes there are lessons to be learned from Thursday’s game, one of which is continued growth. “Sometimes players can get complacent. Our players have come a long way, and it’s human nature to want to hear how much better they are instead of continuing to get pushed to do more,” she explained. “We definitely talk about how much growth can happen, but you cannot put a cap on it and feel like ‘I’ve arrived,’ no matter how far you’ve come. We tell them all the time how excited we are about what they have in front of them and how far they can take it.
“If we grow from this, it will pay off in the end, no doubt. We haven’t come as far as we have this season if we haven’t paid attention to what the season is trying to teach us,” Wiedemann added.
The Grizzlies now will prepare for the NJCAA Region 16 Championship Tournament. Their win Tuesday over MAC insured they would be the No. 1 seed in the two-day event set for March 26-27 on the Jefferson College campus in Hillsboro.
The Grizzlies will face the winner of the March 26 contest between second seeded MAC and third seeded Jefferson at noon March 27.
For more information about the Grizzly Volleyball program, visit www.msuwpgrizzlies.com.
Missouri State University-West Plains empowers students to achieve personal success and to enrich their local and global communities by providing accessible, affordable and quality educational opportunities. Missouri State-West Plains offers associate degrees and credit and non-credit courses and serves as a delivery site for bachelor’s and master’s degrees offered by Missouri State University in Springfield.
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