VB 2
Miranda Sampson
1
Gannon Gannon 27-8,13-1 PSAC
3
Winner Concordia-St. Paul CSP 30-5,19-1 NSIC
Gannon Gannon
27-8,13-1 PSAC
1
Final
3
Concordia-St. Paul CSP
30-5,19-1 NSIC
Winner
Set Scores
Team 1 2 3 4 F
Gannon Gannon 10 29 15 12 (1)
Concordia-St. Paul CSP 25 27 25 25 (3)

Game Recap: Women's Volleyball |

Resilient Golden Knights Fall to No. 2 Seed Concordia-St. Paul in Elite Eight Quarterfinals

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. – The seventh-seeded Gannon volleyball team extended No. 2 seed Concordia-St. Paul to four games but saw its season come to a close on Thursday afternoon with a 3-1 loss to the Golden Bears. The Elite Eight is being held at the Sanford Pentagon.

Concordia-St. Paul (30-5), the Central Region champion, claimed the first set by a 25-10 margin, but the Golden Knights led virtually the entire second set and knotted the match at 1-1 with a 29-27 win. The Golden Bears won the next two sets by scores of 25-15 and 25-12 to advance to Friday's semifinals.

Head coach Matt Darling knew his Golden Knights squad, with a mixture of experience and plenty of youth, would have its hands full against a Concordia-St. Paul team that has won nine NCAA Div. II National Championships. The Golden Knights also own an impressive track record with Darling at the helm, appearing in back-to-back Elite Eights and four in the last five years.

Gannon concludes the season with a 27-8 record, the 16th straight year with 20-or-more wins (excluding the 2020 COVID-shortened season), and ninth consecutive with 25-or-more.   

GOLDEN KNIGHTS SHOW PLENTY OF RESILIENCE
The year began with Darling needing to replace four honorable mention All-Americans and integrate seven freshmen. The Golden Knights went on to win the PSAC West regular season title before losing to East Stroudsburg in the PSAC Championship match. Gannon came back to win the Atlantic Regional, sweeping Indiana (Pa.). Then on Thursday the Golden Knights had to play without Nehir Yazicioglu (Ankara, Turkey) and dropped the first set by 15 points. Back they came to win game two. As always, Darling's teams are resilient.

GOLDEN BEARS USE TWO RUNS TO PULL AWAY IN FIRST SET
Gannon opened the match with the first three points, but two big runs keyed the 25-10 win for Concordia-St. Paul. The Golden Bears scored the next seven points and with the score 13-8 they went on a 10-0 run.

GOLDEN KNIGHTS LEAD FROM START TO FINISH TO TIE THE MATCH
Undaunted by the first set loss Gannon came out fast once again, taking a 4-1 lead. Only this time the Golden Knights featured improved hitting and maintained a narrow lead throughout the set. Leading 24-21, CSP sent the match into extra points with the next three points. The Golden Bears never took the lead with Gannon eventually breaking a 27-27 tie on Carissa Treser's (Sewickley, Pa./North Allegheny) kill. A hitting error followed, giving Gannon the 29-27 win. Kasey Smith (Meadville, Pa./Villa Maria) and Treser had four kills in the set.

GOLDEN EAGLES FLEX MUSCLES IN FINAL TWO GAMES
For the first time in the match Concordia-St. Paul scored the first point of the set in game three. A hitting error and block gave Gannon a 2-1 lead but the Golden Knights spent the last two games on their heels. The Golden Bears were again able to put together runs in both sets while winning game three 25-15 and game four 25-12.    

HITTING THE DIFFERENCE
Concordia-St. Paul came in ranked fourth in Division II in hitting percentage and finished the day at .342, including a sizzling .515 in the first set. As expected Gannon's best showing came in the second game as they hit .400 with 16 kills and just two errors. But the final two sets featured 15 errors.

ARSLAN CONCLUDES BRILLIANT CAREER
Senior Bengisu Arslan (Ankara, Turkey/Private Çankaya Doga Anatolian) concluded a brilliant career with 31 assists and 11 digs. The setter from Ankara, Turkey fell just shy of the school record for assists in a season and departs ranked second in career assists (4,512). She totaled 1,406 assists this season, five shy of Ashley Beyers' total of 1,411 in 2019. Arslan was one of three players named AVCA honorable mention All-Americans earlier in the week. She was joined by Lauren Atwell (Mars, Pa./Mars Area) and Sydney Wake (Massillon, Ohio/Jackson).

BY THE NUMBERS
Freshman Abbey Williams (Chicago, Ill./Mother Mcauley Liberal Arts) led Gannon with nine kills, adding 10 digs, a block solo and a block assist. Freshman libero Alexis Fowler (Cranberry Township, PA/Eden Christian Academy) had a team-high 21 digs. Carissa Treser (Sewickley, Pa./North Allegheny) and Kasey Smith (Meadville, Pa./Villa Maria) had seven kills apiece while Atwell had six kills and three block assists.

FEELING THE WRATH OF THE AVCA PLAYER OF THE YEAR
While Gannon had three All-Americans Concordia-St. Paul countered with the player deemed the best in Division II this year. Makenna Nold, the AVCA Div. II Player of the Year, finished with a match-high 20 kills 
 
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