WICHITA – Facing the end of their season squarely in the face, the Hutchinson Community College volleyball team pulled off one of its greatest comebacks to stay alive in the Region VI Tournament on Saturday at Newman University.
Already relegated to the loser’s bracket after being swept by top-seeded Barton earlier on Saturday, the Lady Dragons were down two sets against them against Colby. HCC rallied all the way back to advance to Sunday’s loser’s bracket final with a stunning 19-25, 25-27, 27-25, 25-20, 15-10 victory over the Trojans.
Barton defeated HCC 25-20, 25-14, 25-14 in the opening round earlier in the day.
“I’m very proud of how we battled back,” HCC head coach Sarah Myers said. “I feel like it took us a while, we had a lot of nerves coming out today, and it took us time to shake everything off and play up to our ability. I felt like this was a team effort. Once the team started to bring the excitement to the court, and then everything started to come together.”
The Lady Dragons (17-22) will play Seward County in Sunday’s loser’s bracket final at Noon. That winner would then have to defeat top-seeded Barton twice to advance to the NJCAA national tournament.
Saturday’s comeback against Colby was only the second time in program history that the Lady Dragons have come back from 0-2 down to win a match. The last time came on September of 2006 at Salt Lake City when HCC rallied from down two sets to knock off College of Southern Idaho.
But with the end of the season coming within a point on Saturday, the Lady Dragons perhaps pulled off the greatest comeback in program history.
In a deep hole after two sets against Colby, For the first time all afternoon, HCC began a game with the lead in the third set, racking up four-straight points behind a kill and a block by Jade Nelson and a service ace by Hailey Young. Emily Oberlin added two key aces at the 15-11 and 17-11 marks to put Colby on its. Cassie Wiley and Shayne Haley took over in the latter moments of the set, combining for four key kills to knot the game at 20-all, 21-all and 23-22. HCC played for set point twice before closing out the win on a trio of kills by Jordan Rehm (2) and Nelson to win 27-25.
HCC again took an early lead in the fourth set, opening on a kill by Haley and taking advantage of Colby errors to go up early 6-2. Strong serving was again the key in the game, with posting four aces in the game, including back to back points by Ashlyn Westerman to take a 16-8 lead over the Trojans. Colby battled back, taking advantage of HCC hitting miscues to get the score to 19-15. The Dragons then took over at the net, with key kills from Nelson, Haley and blocks from Nelson, Young and Wiley to get to 23-17. Colby got as close as four, Emily Oberlin closed it out with a crosscourt kill to give HCC the 25-20 win.
HCC came out on fire in the fifth, taking a 4-2 lead, with Haley opening the decisive set with four kills to take HCC up early. Haley added a critical service ace to get a 6-2 lead for the Dragons, as her serve, which would have been out of bounds, hit the rear end of the Colby player trying to avoid the ball. HCC made the most of the opportunity, behind strong play from Rehm and Wiley, to run up to a 9-3 advantage. Another ace by Westerman, at the 11-3 mark put HCC in control of the tiebreaker. Colby made a late run, behind four kills from Ana Calito, but it was not enough as HCC remained alive in the tournament after a stunning comeback.
BARTON RECAP
Wiley had nine kills and Rehm had four, but top-seeded Barton rolled to a three-set victory over HCC in the opening match of the double-elimination four-team tournament.
“I feel like in the beginning we allowed our nerves to get the best of us, and we never got into the flow of our game,” Myers said. “Now we just have to take this downtime between games to refocus and shake the nerves and finish out today strong.”
Barton started the match strong, posting an opening service ace from Giselle deMoura, but HCC remained close in the match until three-straight errors gave Barton a 12-7 lead. Nelson posted a kill on the right side line for a sideout at 14-17, but Barton scored three-straight points to take control. Wiley had two strong kills at 17-22 and 18-23, but HCC was unable to come back in the game.
HCC struggled early in the second set, allowing three-straight opening points by the Cougars on kills from Paula da Silva and a hitting error on Haley and trailed early 5-4. That when da Silva took over. She posted an ace to take the Cougars to a 6-4 lead and then used a block by Taylor Littleton and Gabriella Olivera and another ace to go up 8-4. HCC’s Young tried to break her serve on a setter tip to the back left corner, but the attempt was wide, and Barton scored two more on consecutive kills by Juliana deBarros to go up 10-5. HCC committed eight hitting errors in the set, and never pulled closer than six in the remainder of the set.
Barton again opened strong, going up 3-0, before Rehm put the Dragons on the board with a kill. Barton then went up 8-2 on three aces by da Silva. After a timeout, HCC was able to break da Silva’s serve with a kill by Rehm, but the Lady Dragons fell behind again, 12-3 on four straight Barton points. Wiley kept HCC in the match with kills at 9-18, 10-20 and 11-22, combined with errors on Barton. HCC held off two match points, with a service ace by Young to pull the Dragons to 14-14, but Barton closed it out with a kill by Gabriella Oliveria.
(HCC Sports Information)