LA GRANDE, Ore. – The Corban University Women's Volleyball team (28-3) kicked off their postseason on a high note this afternoon at Quinn Coliseum, as the Warriors knocked off the 3-seeded Southern Oregon University Raiders (21-10) in the Cascade Collegiate Conference (CCC) Tournament semifinals in four sets, 19-25, 25-19, 25-15, and 25-22.
"SOU came out playing very well tonight, they made their presence known at the net, playing aggressive," Warriors' Head Coach Kim McLain shared following her team's semifinal victory.
"I was proud of how we made adjustments defensively both at the net and in the backcourt. We are looking forward to the opportunity to play in the championship match tomorrow," McLain concluded.
The Warriors started the match extremely flat against the Raiders, allowing SOU to kickstart their first set on a 7-0 run, which put Corban in too much of a hole to possible climb themselves out of. The Navy and Gold were able to pull within four points late in the set, but the damage had already been done to result in a 19-25 loss to Southern Oregon to quickly fall into a 0-1 set deficit.
The second set began in a back-and-forth battle for both the Raiders and Warriors, with neither side willing to budge until the middle of the set when Corban rallied for six-straight points to take a 14-9 lead. Sophomore outside hitter Rylee Troutman had led the Warriors thus far offensively at the net, throwing down the set-winning kill to launch Corban back into this contest with a 25-19 set two win.
Defense at the net propelled the Warriors to the set three victory, as they held Southern Oregon to a negative attacking percentage of -.054 to provide Corban with a dominant 16-8 lead before SOU called their final timeout of the set. Kills from four different Corban student-athletes helped close out the third set for the Warriors, giving them a 2-1 lead to flip the script on SOU.
The fourth and final set provided those present at Quinn Coliseum with the most competitive set of action thus far, as Southern Oregon refused to go down without a fight. After both sides exchanged streaks to begin the set, Corban managed to record an 8-4 point exchange to take a five-point lead, which in the end would prove to be all Corban needed to close out the contest and book a trip to the CCC Championship match.
The Warriors held SOU to a lowly .142 kill percentage for the afternoon, while managing a .248 attacking rate themselves to average more than 20% success rate at the net in each of their sets. The only statistical class that the Raiders led in as team was at the service line, notching four aces to Corban's pair of aces.
Troutman proved her worth as the 2022 CCC Player of the Year tonight with an incredible 19 kills and 18 digs to lead all players in both categories. Meanwhile, sophomore middle blocker Allyson Reid recorded an additional 10 kills on 18 attempts to log a .444 kill percentage on the day.
Setting duo Jadyn Mullen and Abby Guindy powered the Corban offense with 25 and 19 assists, respectively, while senior libero Kealani Ontai added 15 digs in the backcourt to help lead the Warriors to a game-high 60 digs as a team.
Raiders' outside hitters Katie Vroman and Hailey Van Well tallied 12 and 11 kills, respectively, to each record double-digit kill counts, while dual outside hitter/middle blocker Simone Gordon added eight kills and a game-high four block assist at the net.
Setter Hannah Randall dealt out a game-high 36 assists in a full game of action for the 6'1 junior, all while libero Karina Oliveira tacked on a team-high 16 digs to lead Southern Oregon defensively.
The No. 4 Corban Volleyball team will take the court one final time in La Grande tomorrow for the CCC Tournament Championship, as the Warriors will face top seeded Eastern Oregon University (29-2) for the official rubber match with the Mountaineers tomorrow at 3pm PST.
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