By ALAN HOSKINS
Despite a painful four-set loss at Coffeyville Monday night, Kansas City Kansas Community College’s nationally ranked volleyball team will close out one of its best Jayhawk Conference seasons in history Wednesday with a home match with Labette at 6:30 p.m.
Second place in the Jayhawk and district will be on the line for sophomore night with seven sophomores playing their final home contest – Lisa Angello, Tara Van Beek, Sarah Mertens, Jennie Kinsella, Leah Oehm, Chelsea Sheldon-Medina, Courtney Gunnels and Amber Fraser.
The reason finale will come next Tuesday at Longview.
A win Wednesday would assure the Lady Blue Devils of a tie for second place in both the Eastern Division of the Jayhawk and the Division II district standings.
The Blue Devils, who are 8-2 in the district and 26-6 overall and ranked No. 11 in the country, are tied with No. 13 Johnson County (26-4) and Coffeyville (25-10) and could host the district playoffs if Coffeyville were to lose to Fort Scott (22-10) Wednesday night.
Meanwhile, Johnson County hosts unbeaten and No. 1 ranked Cowley County, which is 10-0 in the district and 32-0 overall.
As the No. 1 seed, Cowley will host the District M tournament Nov. 3 while the Lady Blue Devils will play in the District N tournament which will be played at Coffeyville if Coffeyville defeats Fort Scott at home Wednesday.
Monday’s loss at Coffeyville comes on the heels of one of the biggest KCKCC wins of the season. Hosting No. 13 ranked Butler County Friday night, the Blue Devils opened with 25-23 and 25-21 decisions only to drop the next two sets 25-21 and 25-22 before rallying for a 17-15 win in the fifth and deciding set.
Tara Van Beek led the Blue Devils with 17 kills and seven blocks while Sarah Mertens had 15 kills and Lisa Angello 12. In addition, setter Jennie Kinsella had 58 assists while libero Leah Oehm had 30 digs.
After dropping a pair of 25-20 decisions at Coffeyville Monday, the Blue Devils rallied for a 25-16 before the Red Ravens took the fourth set 25-18.
