Pride split final day of Clarke Tournament to close weekend with a win
DUBUQUE, Iowa - Finishing off a two-day, 12-match in total tournament at the Kehl Center, the Clarke University women's volleyball team were able to pick up their first win of the 2025 season in their finale match by a 3-1 final against St. Ambrose University after dropping the day's opener against York University 3-0.
A small lineup change from match one to match two helped lead to an improvement in team hitting percentage from .094 in the opener to .165 in the win as the change was flipping the setting and opposite hitter responsibilities of Kortney Harms and Keely Colyer as Harms moved to primarily set and Colyer played the right side on the front row for both to have quality matches statistically.
Harms produced a team-high 20 assists and a team-high tying 17 digs for her first double-double of the season and Colyer had the second-most kills on the team with 10 kills on 31 swings for a .161 hitting percentage while adding three block assists for an 11.5-point match.
After taking the first two sets by scores of 25-17, the Pride were looking for the sweep after coming back down to set point for the Fighting Bees at 24-22 and forced extra points and even had match point twice at 25-24, and 26-25 but SAU fallied to score three-straight points from then on to win the set 28-26.
The fourth set had plenty of drama as well, also going to extra point with neither team holding more than a one-point lead after Clarke held 21-18 and 21-19 leads but CU avoided needing to play a fifth set after kills by Amelia Driver and Kaelyn Minich gave them a 30-29 lead then Minich would put the exclamation point on the day with a solo block for the win at 31-29 to clinch the match at 3-1.
Driver led the team with 11 kills and Minich had five kills and four total blocks combining with fellow middle blocker Kelsey NeCollins, who led the Pride in points against SAU with eight kills and seven total blocks for a 12-point match and led the team with a .333 hitting percentage.
Mattie Dafforn and Finlay rounded out the attacking effort with eight and seven kills respectively as libero Jayden Knox produced 17 digs to tie Harms' team-high, Jenna Lewis had 15 assists and 12 digs for her second double-double of the season, and Emma Shea-Wopinek also had double digit digs with 11 spelling Driver in the back row for Clarke.
The win would produce the first win in the collegiate head coaching career for Matt Gagner as the Clarke alum took over as the 14th head coach in program history this past spring.
Tight sets were the theme of the entire day as York was able to pull off a first set win 25-23 after ties at 21-21, 22-22, and 23-23 then York was able to run away with a 25-18 second set late before closing out the match with a 25-22 despite CU pulling within a point for a majority of the second half of the match after YU held a 15-12 lead.
Dafforn led the Clarke attackers against York with seven kills while providing a .130 hitting percentage with both Finlay and Driver adding six kills from the outside hitter position and the trio of Harms, Minich, and NeCollins all finishing with five kills and NeCollins leading the team with a .357 hitting percentage.
Pride women's volleyball will be on the road for a single match next Wednesday, Aug. 27 when they travel to Judson University for a 6:00 p.m. CT scheduled first serve in Elgin, Ill. against the Eagles.