SHEPHERDSTOWN, W.V.- After going 1-1 on the final weekend of the regular season, to conclude the year with an overall record of 22-7 and a mark of 10-4 in league play, the No. 3 seeded West Chester women's volleyball team is preparing for a PSAC Quarterfinal battle at No. 2 seed Shepherd. This is the first PSAC Tournament appearance for the Golden Rams since the end of the 2017 season when West Chester advanced to the PSAC Semifinals before falling to Gannon by a 3-0 final.
East Stroudsburg, whom West Chester split its season series with earned the top seed in the East in the PSAC Tournament while Bloomsburg secured the fourth seed in the field thanks to a 3-0 victory over Kutztown on the final day of the regular season.
Tickets to the PSAC Women's Volleyball Tournament are $10 for adults and $5 for students and can be purchased at the door on the day of the event. Students from a PSAC member institution with a valid ID are admitted free. No comp tickets are available. Only PSAC passes will be honored.
History…
West Chester and Shepherd are certainly familiar with one another as the two teams engaged in a five-set battle on Friday evening inside Hollinger field house with Shepherd emerging victorious by a slim 3-2 margin. In this match, West Chester and Shepherd traded sets throughout as the Golden Rams took the first and fourth sets while Shepherd captured the second, third, and fifth sets to earn a crucial victory.
Sarah Polacek (Johnstown, Pa./Westmont-Hilltop) led the Golden Rams in kills on Friday evening, posting a team-high 18 while
Julia Vreewyk (Yardley, Pa./Pennsbury) led the team in blocks with three while also registering 15 kills of her own in the setback.
Ali Miller (Enola, Pa./Cumberland Valley) led the team in digs with 17 while also tying with the PSAC Ace leader
Sydney Heffner (Bath, Pa./Northampton) for the team-lead in aces with three.
This was the second match in the season series between the two PSAC-East foes as the Golden Rams also visited the Rams in West Virginia earlier this year, falling by a final of 3-0 inside the Butcher Athletic Center. In the first meeting, Vreesywk led the team in kills with nine while Heffner led in digs with 11 and aces with two in the 3-0 setback.
In recent history, West Chester and Shepherd have met 10 times dating back to the 2009 season with Shepherd emerging victorious in each of the last seven of these 10 meetings. Additionally, two of the last three meetings between the two teams have gone to five sets as the Golden Rams also took the Rams to five sets back on November 15, 2019.
Scouting West Chester…
Entering the PSAC Tournament, West Chester has three players with 230 or more kills on the season led by Vreeswyk who also ranks third the PSAC East and 10th in the league as a whole in kills on the year with 248 while Polacek and
Olivia Rudjord (Fogelsville, Pa./Allentown Central Catholic) rank second and third on the squad with 243 and 238, respectively.
Grace Whitney (Glenside, Pa./Abington) who ranks fourth on the team in kills with 191 on the season also leads the PSAC East and ranks fifth in the league as a whole in hitting percentage with a team-best .304 percentage. Whitney is one of just two PSAC East players to rank in the top-10 in the league in hitting percentage with the lone other Eastern division player in the top-10 being Rudjord who ranks ninth with a .281 hitting percentage. In addition to Rudjord's impressive hitting performance to this point in the season, she also ranks eighth in the league in blocks with 88 on the year.
Providing an added dimension to the West Chester offense, Heffner also ranks in a tie for first in the PSAC in aces with 60 while still ranking solo atop the league in aces per set, averaging 0.59 per set on the year.
Jamie Byrne (Bethlehem, Pa./Liberty) has emerged as one of the top facilitators in the league this season, ranking fourth in the PSAC and second in the PSAC East in assists with 983 on the season.
Defensively, Heffner leads the team in digs with 410 on the season while Byrne ranks second on the team in digs with 278 on the year.
Scouting Shepherd…
For its part, Shepherd enters play on Tuesday evening with a record of 23-3 and a mark of 12-2 in league play. A difficult team to beat at home, Shepherd is 6-1 in home games this year, dropping just four sets over the course of its six home victories.
Mikaylah Hoy and Kiara Rakestraw are two of the most dangerous players in the Rams lineup, ranking first and second on the team in kills with 278 and 239 kills, respectively. Kitanna Rakestraw sits third on the team in kills with 187 of her own entering the PSAC Tournament.
Kiara Rakestraw also ranks first on the team in aces with 29 while Victoria Nicholes is second on the team in this category with 26 while also leading the team in assists with 828 on the season. Defensively, Claire Ellis ranks ninth in the PSAC in digs with a team-best 470 on the season while Hoy ranks second on the team with 320 digs of her own.
The winner of Tuesday night's quarterfinal matchup will advance to the PSAC Semifinals where they will face the winner of the Gannon/Cal Quarterfinal from the West Division on Friday night at the home of the highest remaining seed in the PSAC East.
