PERU, Neb. – The first set may not have been perfect, but the Concordia University volleyball team dominated for much of the afternoon Saturday (Sept. 21) at Peru State College. Sophomore Arleigh Costello and senior Emmie Noyd attacked with impressive proficiency in helping power the Bulldogs to a 25-22, 25-12, 25-11 road victory.
Head coach Ben Boldt’s program has eaten up overmatched non-league foes. Concordia (13-2) has now won 24 matches in a row against nonconference opponents.
“As the match went on we started playing how we should play,” Boldt said. “That’s the team that I know. Our passing and our serving really improved and we started to find some rhythm on offense. That was good to see.”
The Bulldogs had actually dropped their most recent matchup with the Bobcats (4-15) prior to Saturday. Peru State emerged with a straight sets win (25-17, 25-21, 26-24) inside Walz Arena in 2016. Noyd and company were too good to let that happen this time around. Noyd swatted a match high 12 kills and hit .632. Meanwhile, Costello added 10 kills and attacked at a .563 clip. As a team, Concordia outhit Peru State, .393 to .081.
“Arleigh did a really good job today,” Boldt said. “She got us out of some out-of-system situations and she brought it with her attack. It was nice to see her get going. I think that’s something we can continue to use as the season goes along. And then our middles have been playing well so we’re going to try and get them the ball.”
Concordia got pushed in the first set. One of Claire Cudney’s seven kills knotted the opening set, 20-20. That’s when things got good for the Bulldogs. Tara Callahan found Noyd for a kill to initiate a 3-0 mini run. Noyd eventually ended the set with another kill. Concordia took over from there while jumping out to leads of 13-3 in the second set and 21-8 in the third.
The Bulldogs entered the weekend wanting to clean things up in both serve and serve receive. Kaci Hohenthaner and Tristin Mason both dropped in three aces. Concordia put up 12 aces to nine service errors while limiting the Bobcats to three aces (against three service errors). The Bulldogs also had a sizeable 8-1 advantage in blocks. Freshman Kalee Wiltfong was in on five blocks.
This was a solid tune up and confidence builder for the GPAC grind the rest of the way. Said Boldt, “It was a chance to focus on ourselves for a couple of days. I think that was the biggest thing we got out of this week. It was a nice change of pace and we were able to figure some things out about our team.”
Concordia will be headed to Doane (11-6, 2-2 GPAC) on Wednesday for a 7:30 p.m. CT matchup in Crete. The Bulldogs hope to duplicate the result they got at the end of the 2018 regular season when they won at Doane in straight sets.