MOUNT VERNON, Iowa – A phenomenal Grinnell College volleyball season drew to a close Saturday afternoon with a four-set loss to Cornell College in the Midwest Conference Tournament title match.
Cornell rallied from an opening-set loss to win 20-25, 25-9, 25-16 and 25-19 to claim the crown and the league's automatic berth to the NCAA Division III National Tournament.
Grinnell finished with a 20-14 mark, the fourth-highest win total in program history. MWC Player of the Year
Kaylin Kuhn '22 wrapped up her stellar career with 10 kills, while
Anna Killin '23 added seven.
Emily Brewer '24 and
Julianna Roth '22 had 12 and 11 assists, respectively, and
Payton Lowrey '23 came up with 15 digs and two service aces.
Julianna Vajda '24 also served two aces and Killin was credited with four blocks.
Grinnell used a huge comeback to take the first set. After digging itself into a 10-5 hole, the Pioneers went on a four-point run that included a kill by Kuhn and ace by Vajda to close the gap to 10-9.
After Cornell scored a point, the Pioneers responded with five points in a row. The spurt included an ace by Lowrey and kills from Kuhn and Killin as Grinnell built a 14-11 lead. Grinnell gradually pulled away, scoring the deciding point on Killin's kill.
The Rams won the second set convincingly, but Grinnell built an 8-7 lead in the third set thanks to a four-point service run by
Emmy Nyquist '24. However, the Rams went on a 10-1 run to pull away for the win.
Grinnell played catch-up most of the fourth set, but could never quite pull even as the Rams eked out the win to improve to 20-11 on the season.
The season saw several Grinnell records toppled, including career marks by Kuhn (1716 kills, 4.21 kills per set, 199 aces, 1988 points and 4.87 points per set) and Jensen (.323 hitting efficiency). Nyquist set a season record with a 98.3 percent serve reception figure, and Grinnell set a team reception mark with a 91.5 percent success rate.
A more detailed story about Grinnell's broken records and entries into the program's all-time top 10 will appear in the upcoming days.
