The South Dakota State volleyball team traveled to Western Illinois for the Leatherneck Classic last Friday and Saturday.
The Jacks continued their undefeated start to the season by winning all three matches in the tournament with Alyssa Groves taking home the tournament MVP.
They improved to 6-0 early on, which is the best start to a volleyball season since 2002 and the best start in the Division I era at South Dakota State University.
Graduate student and first-year Jackrabbit player Groves has an idea of why the team has gotten off to this hot start.
“We basically got 20 extra days of volleyball,” said Groves. “And to do that in a different country too is just a new experience, new culture and I think as a whole that made our group core together.”
South Dakota State University started the tournament against Western Illinois winning the match 3-2. Set one ended closely at 23-25, a loss for South Dakota State. Though the Jacks bounced back by taking sets two (25-22) and three (25-21). Western Illinois took set four to make the match record 2-2 but SDSU took the final set 15-10.
Sophomore Sylvie Zgonc led the way with 22 kills, an ace and one block while Sydni Schetnan followed with 16 kills and three blocks of her own.
Madison Burr and Groves had 14 and 13 kills respectively, with both student athletes contributing with six blocks each. Rylee Martin also had a fantastic outing in the first match recording 58 assists. Which is not only a career best for the sophomore, but also the most assists for a Jackrabbit in a match since 2021.
Match two went a bit easier for the Jacks as they completed the match set over UIC. Set one finished at 25-18, set two at 25-23 and set three’s final score was 25-22.
SDSU’s offense cooled off in the second with Zgonc once again leading the team with 9 kills while also adding on 1 ace and 3 blocks.
Groves and Katie Van Egdom followed closely behind with 7 kills each while Martin once again put-up double-digit assists with 15.
Even though the offense wasn’t as potent in the second match the defense picked up the slack.
Freshman Burr led the defense with 10 blocks and 9 block assists which both tied a school record for a three-set match.
This wasn’t the only record breaking SDSU did in the second match. They also recorded 18 blocks in the match which is a school record for a match of any length.
With all the pressure on the Jackrabbits to continue the win streak they delivered in the third match by winning three straight sets after losing the first.
“We had to come back and play UIC less than hours later,” said South Dakota State head volleyball coach Dan Georgalas. “I mean it’s food, it’s a quick debrief and we made lineup changes. And none of our players got frustrated, they looked at each other and smiled and said let’s go let’s do this together. Our group came together, and they came out with a ton of energy against UIC. We go up 5-0 and we sweep a really, really good team.”
They finished off the last day of the tournament by beating Purdue Fort Wayne 3-1.
After the Mastodons took set one 24-26 but the Jackrabbits quickly took charge as they won set two 25-19, set three 25-20 and set four 25-22.
In the final match of the tournament, Zgonc managed to notch 15 kills and 5 aces. Which matched her career best for aces in a match.
Groves and Schetnan also helped with the scoring duty. Groves totaled up 11 kills and 6 blocks while Schetnan tallied 9 kills and 7 blocks.
Martin once again stuffed the stat sheet with 24 assists. But she wasn’t the only one setting up her teammates. Camryn Honn also totaled double-digit assists with 17.
And even after a weekend of a lot of record-breaking performances head coach Gerogalas isn’t planning on slowing down.
“We want to go into our next tournament figuring out what’s the next program record for us to break,” said Gerogalas.
SDSU’s Volleyball team will now head to Eastern Illinois this Friday, September 13 for their next match.