The Park University Gilbert volleyball team split a double header at the Arizona Christian Triangular this afternoon in Glendale, Ariz., dropping the first contest to ACU 3-1 (24-26, 20-25, 25-21, 21-25) and winning the second contest against Trinity International 3-2 (22-25, 25-20, 17-25, 25-16, 15-10). With the split the Bucs are now 1-3 on the season as they finish their non-conference season.
Against Arizona Christian, at first glance if you looked at the box score and didn't know the final result, you might have guessed the Bucs won. They had more kills (55-54), aces (7-4), attacks (153, 143), assists (55-51) and digs (65-58) and managed to hit .209, but still wound up on the short end of the score on the board.
Outside hitter Amanda Jonovich set a career high for kills in match one with 19. The total was the second most in Bucs history for a match and put her in a tie with fellow teammate Miranda Bacon with that total. She also had her first double-double of the season as she added 12 digs. Senior middle Kayla Wieserman had her best match of the season with 11 kills, one error and a .588 hitting percentage, the fourth-best hitting percentage of her career in a match.
Bacon totaled 10 kills; her second double digit kill mark of the season. Elizabeth Clemit had five block assists for the game, to go along with her three kills.
Jenifer Lauer who got her first start of the year, had eight kills (.438%) and 39 assists for the match along with 14 digs for an assist-dig double-double.
Match two against Trinity International saw Jonovich come of age, as she put the Bucs on her back and carried them to their first win of the season. Jonovich broke her career record from the previous match and set the new Park Gilbert record for kills in a match with 25 breaking the previous record of 20 set by Autumn Wood in 2019.
"She is an amazing talent," Bucs head coach Clay Webb said of Jonovich. "She is just starting to scratch the surface of what she is capable of doing."
The two teams split the first two sets, the Trojans winning set one, and the Bucs coming back to snag set two in a dominant set which would set the tone for the finish of the match. The Bucs won set two with 20 kills and only one error as a team. Jonovich had 14 kills after the first two stanzas.
Set three saw Park have a major let down after the high of set two. The Trojans dominated play and the Buccos committed 10 errors to give TIU a 2-1 lead after a 25-17 shellacking. Jonovich only added two kills to her total in the third.
With everything that has gone wrong for the Bucs in their first three matches, it could have been easy to throw in the towel, but this is a resilient group who still believes there are great things in store this season and they played like it in sets four and five.
Set four saw the Bucs turn the tables on TIU and return the favor with 25-16 fourth set win. Park cut their error total in half from the previous set and Jonovich recorded four kills as she was about to put her stamp on the final frame.
Entering the final stanza, Jonovich had 20 kills which tied the school record. On the very first point of the set, she scalded kill number 21 to set the record, but she was not done. Jonovich would score a third of the Bucs points in the fifth set, putting away her 25th kill of the night on final point as she ended the match with another authoritative blast from her cannon of a right arm. As a final exclamation point on what this team is capable of accomplishing, the Buccaneers had 10 kills and no errors as a team in the final frame.
Jonovich was not alone in setting records on the evening. Georgia Romine-Black set a career record for kills in the match with 14. A mark which on most nights would lead the team. She hit .379 for the match. Bacon had another solid outing with 13 kills and 15 digs. Lauer posted her second-best assist night of her career with 58 dimes, which only trails her match last year where she posted 65 helpers against Benedictine-Mesa. Not to be outdone, Clemit set a new career high with 12 kills and added three block assists.
The Buccaneers now have a fortnight before entering conference play. In the interim, Park Gilbert will play a exhibition match against Yavapai College next Friday, Sept. 9 to stay sharp before hitting the road for their first three conference matches against Saint Katherine (Thur., Sept. 16), Marymount California (Fri., Sept. 17) and Westcliff (Sat., Sept. 18).
