NCAC Tournament Preview: Volleyball

Outlook: The College of Wooster volleyball team (7-15, 2-5 North Coast Athletic Conference) is off to Wittenberg University's Pam Evans Smith Arena for this week's single-elimination NCAC Tournament, which takes place November 4-5. Wooster, the sixth seed in this year's tournament, takes on Kenyon College (4-20, 2-5 NCAC) at 4 p.m. on Friday, with the winner advancing to play third-seed Ohio Wesleyan University (11-13, 5-2 NCAC) at 7:30 p.m. The winner of Friday's 7:30 p.m. match has a date with second-seeded Denison University (12-12, 6-1 NCAC) at 11 a.m. on Saturday, with the winner of the semifinal playing in the championship match at 5 p.m. Other competing teams are top-seeded Wittenberg (21-4, 7-0 NCAC), fourth-seeded DePauw University (9-15, 3-4 NCAC), fifth-seeded Hiram College (13-12, 3-4 NCAC), and eighth-seeded Oberlin College (7-15, 0-7 NCAC).

Ticket Information: Ticket prices for NCAC Tournaments are set by the conference office. For volleyball, admission is $7.00 per day for adults, $3.00 per day for children, and students who attend a NCAC institution are admitted free with their NCAC institution's ID card. One ticket is good for all matches on that day.

Media Coverage: Wittenberg will provide live stats for each match, links to which can be found on Wittenberg's tournament webpage.

Tournament Format: Starting in 2017, the NCAC Tournament switched to a single-elimination format. The top two seeds (Wittenberg and Denison) have a bye until Saturday's semifinal matches. The third and fourth seeds (Ohio Wesleyan and DePauw) have a bye for the first round of the tournament. Previously, quarterfinal losers met in consolation semifinals and then played in the appropriate fifth- or seventh-place matches. The NCAC's senior ceremony and announcement of the all-conference team will take place at the conclusion of Friday's 4 p.m. matches.

Recapping Last Year's Title Match Run: Wooster made its first appearance in the NCAC Tournament title match since 1985, and just its third ever, at the 2021 NCAC Tournament. The Scots swept aside Oberlin 25-17, 25-13, 25-21 in the opening round, then secured a semifinal berth for the first time since 2012 with a 25-23, 25-12, 25-12 sweep over Hiram. Wooster dethroned NCAC champion Denison 28-26, 25-19, 19-25, 26-24 in the semifinal match. Against Denison, Wooster logged 20 kills in set one and 18 more in set two. Alumna Katie Billetdeaux set a new career-high with 22 kills against the Big Red, then-junior Hayley Nash (Peoria, Ariz./Xavier College Preparatory) followed with 20, and then-junior Sydney Fitzcharles (Twinsburg, Ohio/Beaumont School) added a season-high 28 digs. Alumna Syd Case passed out 57 assists in the semifinal win, the most in a match in the current scoring era. Wooster's 70 kills against Denison were also a scoring-era record.

Last Meeting – Kenyon: Wooster shined in its home finale on October 19, scoring its first conference win of the year, 25-21, 21-25, 25-21, 25-21 over Kenyon. Fitzcharles recorded a season-high 26 digs in the win. Senior Emily Gail (Euclid, Ohio/Villa Angela-St. Joseph) added a season-best 14 kills, a total three off her career-high. Nash served up eight aces, the second-most in a match in program history during the current scoring era.

Last Meeting – Ohio Wesleyan: Wooster played an energized third set but could not carry that momentum over in a 25-15, 25-15, 18-25, 25-16 loss to Ohio Wesleyan on October 12. Wooster scored nine straight points in the third set to turn an 11-9 deficit into an 18-11 lead. Junior Troy Johnson (Olympia Fields, Ill./University of Chicago Laboratory School) had two blocks and a kill during the run, while Nash capped it with three consecutive kills.

Last Meeting – Denison: Nash posted a double-double with a match-high 19 kills and 10 digs, but Denison ended up with a three-set victory (25-22, 25-18, 25-20) on October 1. Fitzcharles added 19 digs in the meeting, which was the first between the programs since the Scots knocked the 2021 NCAC champion out of the NCAC Tournament in the semifinals.

Scots Hit Milestones: Nash recorded her 1,000th career kill during Wooster's sweep over Oberlin on October 26 to become the eighth player in program history and first since Paige Parker (2010-13) to hit the milestone. Fitzcharles surpasses 1,000 career digs against Alma College back on the opening weekend of the year. She is now seventh all-time with 1,316 digs, and that is the top total since Gabrielle Basinski's 1,828 from 2015-18.

Scots Ace Opposition: Nash's eight aces against Kenyon on October 19 set off a stretch of three straight matches where a Scot had at least eight aces. Fitzcharles followed Nash's effort up with eight against Averett University (Virginia) on October 21, then Nash tied the single-match program record with nine in the October 21 nightcap against St. Mary's College (Indiana). Nash's aces were most since alumna McKenna Gassman's nine against University of Akron-Wayne College in 2017. As a team, Wooster had 17 aces against St. Mary's, the most since serving up 19 against Denison in a 2018 match. Wooster has six matches this year with at least 10 aces.

Balance it Out: Nash and Gail are both averaging north of two kills per set this fall. Nash has 12 double-digit showings in kills this year, with the most recent one coming against Averett (October 21). Gail's 2.13 kills per set is just off a career-high 2.16 from a year ago. She has six double-digit kills outings this year, with the 14 against Kenyon being the most recent.