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WNCC volleyball falls to No. 4 NJC in regular season finale
It wasn’t the way the nine sophomores wanted to go out on their final home game of the regular season when the 16th-ranked Cougars were swept by No. 4 Northeastern Junior College 25-17, 25-17, 25-10.

It wasn’t the way the nine sophomores wanted to go out on their final home game of the regular season when the 16th-ranked Cougars were swept by No. 4 Northeastern Junior College 25-17, 25-17, 25-10.
WNCC drops to 26-8 on the season and sophomore Tamika Eastman said they know what they need to work on in the next week to prepare for the Region IX tournament in Cheyenne, Wyoming, that begins November 6.
“I think it is a lot more emotional than what we all thought it was. I think we played pretty decent, pretty solid, but the main thing is our energy wasn’t just up,” Eastman said. “I mean, you saw at the end of the second set, when we have energy and get really, really good blocks or kills, it steps up our game a whole another level. I think that is what we were missing tonight. The emotions were getting to us.”
This match was one where WNCC knew they were going to be the second seed from the South no matter if they won or lost. That was a given, but what the Cougars were trying to do was go unbeaten at home. They gave NJC a battle, but just didn’t do some of the small things to get the win.
Service runs were key in the contest. When WNCC got service runs, they were running a good offense. But, NJC got the better of the Cougars with more 3-or-more service point runs than the Cougars.
Eastman said minimizing those service runs is crucial.
“I think it is important (to minimize the service runs) but I think it is a much bigger game of sideout,” Eastman said. “That is where we lacked a little bit. They were not serving as well as the were the last time we played them. I think our serve receive was much better today.”
The first set was close as the Cougars tied the set at 7-7 after Ahleejah Tovo-Sunia two points. The Cougars were within 15-13 but NJC’s Rebecca Wiersema had three straight points for a 19-13 lead. NJC won the first 25-17 after two points by Nerea Alvarez-Jorge.
Sophomore Chloe Grady got two early kills as the score was tied at 2-2. NJC pushed the lead to 17-7 after five points from Rosa Brencic and led 22-11. Finja Schul stopped the run with a kill and then Tova-Sunia served five points to bring the Cougars to within 22-17. NJC won the second 25-17 after two points by Avery Burdette.
The third set started close as well, but big service runs by the Plainswomen pushed the lead to 23-9 and NJC went on to get the win 25-10.
WNCC hit just .071 for the match and had just two service aces. Eastman led the way with seven kills with five digs. Schul tallied five kills with four blocks, while Lilly Zwart and Grady each had three kills.
Taylor Tyser tallied 17 digs while birthday girl Alex Gonzalez-Orozco had eight digs.
Nira Marginean tallied just 19 set assists with eight digs, while Tovo-Sunia had four digs with eight service points.
Eastman was one of nine sophomores that spent two years at WNCC that were recognized after the game. For Eastman, she came to WNCC from the small high of Sioux County located in Harrison and what she accomplished her sophomore year was something that she will cherish.
“For me it is huge because I did not think I could play college being from a smaller school in Nebraska,” she said. “It is great to be seeing my hard work finally paying off and playing with these top-notch girls and being 16th in the nation in junior colleges, it is tough so it is a great accomplishment.”
There were a lot of emotions on the floor after the contest knowing that many of the players played their last match on Cougar Palace. Eastman said this group of sophomores is special to her.
“It is special especially what we went through last year and us sophomores have really stuck together,” she said. “We really leaned on each other this year and we were all level-headed, all of us even the freshmen on the team, we were just really close with each other and we never fought or had any animosities, so that is what made us so close; we just worked with each other.”