Brady's Roadhouse

The Rudy Marisa Fieldhouse hosted the first Waynesburg women’s volleyball home game of the season against the visiting Chatham Cougars on Tuesday night. After coming off a double header loss to the 2019 PAC runner up Geneva Golden Tornadoes, the Yellow Jackets turned things around in their first match against Chatham.

The Cougars took the first set 25-16, but the next three straight sets belonged to the Yellow Jackets by scores of 27-17, 25-21, and 25-20.

“The biggest thing that helped us win today was us believing in ourselves in addition to everything else that we do,” said Waynesburg head coach Emily Taylor. “We just had a better game plan, and we knew what Chatham was going to throw at us and be prepared for it.”

Waynesburg senior outside hitter Hannah Colvin led the Yellow Jackets with 13 kills in addition to contributing two blocks of her own. Sophomore middle hitter and transfer Alexys Marsh led Waynesburg in blocks with three, and as a team, the Yellow Jackets kept Chatham to just one block the entire match.

“Our hitters did a great job of finding the floor,” said Taylor. “If they were going deep, they were going deep, and then they switched it up and went short to keep the defense on their toes.”

Chatham’s sophomore outside hitter Rylee Ritko led both teams with 14 kills, while graduate student middle blocker Macy King was the one and only block that the Cougars could manage.

The tables would turn at the Rudy Marisa Fieldhouse, however, for the second match of the double header. All three sets went to Chatham by scores of 25-19, 25-23, and 25-22.

The first set yielded 10 errors for Waynesburg, something to which Colvin correlates to the energy of the team.

“It’s very tiring playing two games back-to-back,” said Colvin. “ I think that we just played a little bit sloppier and we needed to clean it up.”

Colvin led the Yellow Jackets with 10 kills in the second match, and once again, Waynesburg held Chatham to only 1 block in comparison to the Yellow Jackets’ six.

Chatham’s freshman outside hitter Paige Bogozi, who contributed only four kills in the first match, surprised the Yellow Jackets in the second match by leading her team with a match-high 12 kills.

Waynesburg junior libero Alyson Johnson, who led Waynesburg in digs in their previous matchup against Geneva, once again led the Yellow Jackets in digs for both matches (30, 23).

“Not only does she get all of those digs, but she’s a really big voice on the court,” said Colvin. “She’s very positive and full of a lot of energy.”

The Yellow Jackets (1-3) travel to Steubenville, Ohio on Friday, March 6 to face the Franciscan University Barons (0-1) in a double header. The matches begin at 6 p.m. and 8 p.m.