Winthrop volleyball to lean on tough non-conference schedule for postseason run

Winthrop volleyball’s team had a rough start to the season.

After a 3-0 sweep by Eastern Kentucky on Sept. 15 in the Eagles’ first match of the Winthrop Invitational, Winthrop found itself 0-10 after its sixth three-set loss.

The Eagles’ opponent the following day was South Carolina — an opponent with a 6-2 record that Winthrop had not beaten in more than a decade.

Winthrop dropped the first set of match and its 10th-consecutive set overall.

However, the Eagles turned it around and won each of the next three sets to beat South Carolina 23-25, 25-14, 27-25, 25-21.

“I think against Eastern Kentucky...we all knew we were capable of winning,” All-Big South Second-Team selection Avery Jolley said. “And then I think we all just got to the point where we’re just fed up. I got injured in the (Eastern Kentucky) game, so there were just a lot of ups and downs. It was ugly volleyball, and I think we finally said enough, and against South Carolina, we just let out all of our anger from our past mistakes.”

Jolley, a sophomore outside hitter, did not play in the comeback win over the Gamecocks. She was replaced by freshman Reece Rhoads, who finished the match tied with the most kills.

However, despite the victory, Winthrop still found itself in a tough spot with a 1-10 record and nursing multiple injuries heading into conference play.

But that’s exactly what head coach Heather Gearhart wanted her team’s non-conference schedule to be — tough.

“We played the third-ranked team in the nation (Florida),” the second-year head coach said. “We played five Power 5 teams (Florida, North Carolina State, Clemson, Rutgers, South Carolina), and that’s naturally going to have some ebb and flow in it. We played six teams that were in the Top 100, and so we definitely challenged ourselves pretty early and made sure we were facing a high level of competition so that come Big South time we could go 12-2 as we did.”

Winthrop’s lone losses during the rest of the season came against eventual Big South-champion High Point.

The Eagles went 0-3 against the Panthers, including two regular-season sweeps and a five-set loss in the conference championship game.

Against everyone else, Winthrop was 13-0, giving the Eagles their current 14-13 record.

“It was definitely a hard preseason, to say the least,” senior libero Maddie Gorniak said. “But we learned a lot from it, and we grew so that when we got to conference play, we’d be kind of reaching our full potential. I think we were just reaching our full potential by the time we got to Big South.”

Now, Winthrop sets its sights on the National Invitational Volleyball Championship (NIVC) as the Eagles enter the tournament with one of the 10 automatic qualifying spots.

Winthrop’s first-round match will be against Georgia Southern at 2 p.m. Dec. 1 at East Carolina University in Greenville.

It’s an exciting opportunity for an Eagles team that has been firing on all cylinders since the start of conference play two months ago.

Gorniak said that she’s excited to see if the team continues its stretch of good play into the NIVC.

“It’s the first time we’ve had a postseason bid since 2019,” Gorniak said. “So I haven’t been a part of a postseason, so it’s really exciting for me to still be playing, especially as a senior. It’s not over for me yet. It’s fun that we can still come to the gym every day, and we’re fortunate and grateful for it.”

One thing about Friday’s match for Winthrop is how relatively unknown of an opponent Georgia Southern is.

Each of the Eagles’ last 17 matches were played against opponents they played last season.

No one on the roster or staff was on the team the last time Winthrop played Georgia Southern back in 2019.

However, Gearhart is more than confident in her team’s ability to prepare for the match and expects Winthrop’s non-conference schedule to pay dividends over two months later.

“Sam (Greenslade) does a really nice job scouting, and the players absorb the scouting reports really well,” Gearhart said. “We’ll get to looking at them this week after we’ve worked on ourselves a little bit. With the variety of opponents that we did see in the non-conference, there’s not too much style of play that we haven’t covered.”

“(Georgia Southern) comes from the Sun Belt, a really high level conference that has four teams with at-large bids to the NCAA tournament, which is huge for a mid-major conference. They’re going to be different than the level of competition that we’re used to facing day in and day out, so I think that’s going to be a nice challenge for us.”

The winner of the Winthrop-Georgia Southern match will go on to face the winner of host East Carolina and The Citadel.

That match is scheduled for 6 p.m. Dec. 2.