Lady Tiger volleyball team goes 4-0 at challenging Triton Invitational Tourney

With the playoffs looming and coming off of the Pensacola Premiere Tournament in Florida the previous week, the top ranked Cowley College volleyball team traveled to Iowa Central for the Triton Invitational Tournament. At the tournament, the Lady Tigers played against No. 10 ranked Iowa Central, Des Moines Area Community College, No. 25 ranked Madison College, and No. 5 ranked Richard Bland. The Lady Tigers defeated all four teams to improve their record to 31-0 on the season and extends their winning streak to 72 matches. 

Coming off of the road win against Jayhawk Conference foe Kansas City Kansas Community College on Wednesday, the Lady Tigers looked to carry the momentum into the key matches in the Triton Invitational Tournament. Cowley used their solid serving combined with a balanced attack and speed of their offense to cause problems for tenth-ranked Iowa Central. The Lady Tigers maintained the lead throughout the set to give Cowley the 25-19 first-set win. 

In the second set, the set was more of the same with Cowley jumping out to a strong lead and ended with a 25-19 win. In the third set, Cowley turned up the heat on their serving game and balanced attack combined with a stellar defense that allowed the team to dominate Iowa Central for the 25-6 win. 

For the match, Laura Bonomi recorded her 16^th double-double on the season by leading the team with 15 kills with 12 digs and 2 aces. She was followed by Josci Buckley, who had 9 kills, Sara Puskas, who had 8 kills and a .533 hitting percentage, Lu Ceroni with five kills, and Valarie Luna with four kills. Hanna Darvas recorded 34 assists. Jessi Ritchhart, recorded 12 digs to lead the team on defense. Cowley hit .270 with 42 kills, 7 aces, 51 digs, and 4 blocks while holding Iowa Central to a .000 hitting percentage and 14 kills.

Coming off of the win over Iowa Central, the second match of the first day was against formerly ranked Des Moines Area. In the first set, Des Moines Area came out on fire. Combined with Des Moines Area's hot play and Cowley starting out slow, Cowley fell in set one 25-22. 

In the second set, Cowley bounced back and cleaned up their unforced errors, served more aggressively, balanced their attack, and ratcheted up their defensive presence. Just as with Iowa Central, the Lady Tigers put too much pressure on Des Moines Area, in set two, to get the lead and never look back for the 25-16 win. 

The third set, Des Moines Area bounced back from their tough second set loss and came out on fire with a back-and-forth match between the two programs, but Cowley came out on top with the score of 25-23. 

Just as in the second set, Cowley pushed hard with the balanced attack, strong serve, and cranked up the defense even more, to put Des Moines Area on their heels the whole set. The result was a 25-13 win. 

Individually, Laura Bonomi led all players with her 17^th double-double of the season, finishing with 21 kills and 10 digs along with 2 aces and a .372 hitting percentage.  Sara Puskas followed with 15 kills and Josci Buckley added 13 kills. Lu Ceroni recorded ten kills while hitting a team high .471 hitting percentage. Hanna Darvas earned her 10^th double-double of the season, dishing out 53 assists to go along with 10 digs. Jessi Ritchhart led the defense with 20 digs for the match and Kailea Trinque added 10 digs. Cowley recorded a .266 hitting percentage with 62 kills, 7 aces, 67 digs, and 2 blocks while holding Des Moines Area to a .080 hitting percentage and 24 kills. 

On day two of the Triton Invitational Tournament, Cowley was up against #25 Madison College. In set one, Madison put pressure on Cowley, which resulted in a back-and-forth game. Cowley went on a key run that allowed the team to pull away for the 25-18 win. In set two, Madison capitalized on timely errors while playing more aggressively with timely hitting and defense. The set then became back-and-forth before Cowley pulled away in the end for the 25-19 win. 

In set three, Cowley bounced back with even more determination with their aggressive serving, balanced attack, and strong defense to jump out to a big lead and never looked back as the Lady Tigers went on to a 25-15 win. 

In the match, Lu Ceroni led the way with 13 kills while also hitting a team leading .765 hitting percentage. Laura Bonomi followed with her 18^th double-double on the season with 12 kills, 2 aces, and 10 digs. Sara Puskas recorded 10 kills while hitting .400 with 1 ace and 1 block, and Josci Buckley also recorded 10 kills while hitting a .320 hitting percentage. Hanna Darvas earned her 11^th double-double of the season, dishing out 40 assists to go along with 10 digs. Jessi Ritchhart led the team in digs by recording 17 digs in the match. Cowley recorded a .378 hitting percentage with 49 kills, 4 aces, 52 digs, and 2 blocks. 

The second match of day two was the marquee match of the tournament. This match placed No. 1 Cowley (2023 NJCAA national champion) up against the No. 5 ranked Richard Bland (2022 NJCAA national champion). In set one, Cowley came out on fire with strong and aggressive serving, combined with a potent offense and defense that has been so critical in their game all season. Richard Bland had no answer for the Lady Tiger push with the 25-9 win for Cowley. 

In set two, the Lady Tigers carried over the momentum of the first set. Cowley continued their strong serving and used their "lock down" defense to allow the Cowley offense to explode for the 25-10 win. 

In set three, Richard Bland bounced back in getting their offense going and limiting their unforced errors. However, Cowley was still hot from the previous two sets and cruised to the 25-17 win. 

In the match, Laura Bonomi recorded her 19^th double-double on the season by leading the team with 15 kills with 12 digs and 1 aces while also hitting a .583 hitting percentage. Sara Puskas followed with 11 kills while hitting a team leading .714. Josci Buckley also recorded 11 kills while hitting .429. Lu Ceroni recorded eight kills on nine swings with one block. Valarie Luna added two kills with one block. Hanna Darvas dished out a career-high 40 assists with a season high eight aces. Jessi Ritchhart led the way with 15 digs in the match. Cowley recorded a hitting percentage of .579 with 49 kills, 9 aces, 44 digs, and 2 blocks while holding Richard Bland to a .099 hitting percentage, 19 kills and 2 aces. 

Coach Steven Gream had this to say about four four-match tournament.

"Coming off of the Pensacola Premier Tournament in Florida and the win over KCK, we managed to continue the momentum going into the matches this weekend," Gream said. "The Triton Invitational tournament is always a challenging tournament and was an even bigger challenge with us having played ten matches in ten days against eight ranked teams. We had a few dips with fatigue being a factor but pushed through to pull away from our opponents for wins. The tournament pushed us to continue our strong offense with a balanced attack but to also enhance our aggressive serving and defense. Our defense and serving allowed us to build our leads by allowing our offense to get easy balls to put away in transition. Our players gained valuable experience that will prepare them for the rest of our conference play and the postseason."

Up next for the Cowley volleyball team is a road match against Jayhawk Conference foe Fort Scott on Wednesday, October 30, at 6:30 p.m., then travel to Friends University before coming home to play Jayhawk Conference foe Hesston College for the final regular season match and sophomore night on Saturday at 6:30 p.m.