Ravens Volleyball made program history Saturday night.
The Ravens defeated the MidAmerica Nazarene University Pioneers in a five-set thriller to capture the 2024 Heart Women's Volleyball Conference Tournament Championship, a first for the Ravens.
Both the No. 2 seed Ravens and No. 5 seed Pioneers battled to five-set wins in the semifinals, so it made perfect sense that the teams would take it the distance in Atchison on Saturday.
In the deciding fifth set, the Ravens jumped out to an early 6-2 lead only to see the Pioneers move in front, 8-7, as the teams swapped sides of the court.
With the match on the line, the Ravens played their best and scored 3-straight to take an 11-9 lead. The Pioneers got back to within a single point at 13-12, but two straight points – the first a kill by Maura Lickteig and then a block by Hokulani Sagapolu and Winny Harris – gave the Ravens the 15-12 set win and 3-2 match victory.
Sagapolu led the way with 15 kills for the Ravens, followed by Harris with 12, Lickteig with 11 and Mahala Sewell with 10 kills.
Haley Cahill notched 50 assists and had 11 digs and 2 aces. Evelyn Arreola was strong defensively with 28 digs and Sagapolu added 14 digs.
The Ravens had 9 aces in the match as Lauren Stanga, Marissa Mantz and Sewell joined Cahill with 2 each, and Sagapolu adding another.
The Ravens put together a strong first set to take a 1-0 lead in the match. The Ravens trailed 6-5 early but went on a fantastic run the remainder of the set. A 6-0 run gave the Ravens a 21-12 lead and overall the Ravens closed out the set on a 20-9 run to win the opener, 25-15.
The Pioneers tied the match at 1-1 with a 25-21 win in the second set. After the Ravens held the Pioneers to a negative .026 attack percentage in the opening set, MNU responded in a big way by hitting .394 in the second set. The Ravens held an early 10-5 lead, but the Pioneers went on a 9-3 run to take a lead that they held the remainder of the set.
The Ravens took a 2-1 lead in the match thanks to a 25-21 win in the third set, though the score wound up tighter than it looked at one point in the third. The Ravens took a 20-11 lead and looked to be in complete control, but the Pioneers rattled off a 9-1 run to pull within a point at 21-20. However, the Ravens closed out the set to move in front 2-1 in the match. The Ravens made it more difficult for the Pioneers to hit in the third set, limiting MNU to a .061 attack percentage.
The Ravens fell behind 5-0 to open the fourth set and then spent the rest of the set trying to erase that early deficit. They nearly did it, getting within 2 points at 15-13, but the Pioneers held on to win the set 25-18, setting up a winner-take-all fifth set.
As they had done all night, both teams fought for every point in the fifth set. It was the Ravens ultimately, coming out on top on their home court.
Saturday's win was the first conference tournament championship for the Ravens as they lost in the match in 2009, the only other time the Ravens had advanced to the final match.
The Ravens (25-7) now await the NAIA National Tournament and will find out who and where they will play when the NAIA Selection Show airs at 12 p.m. Monday, Nov. 18.
