Pride drop Senior Day battle in five sets to Graceland

DUBUQUE, Iowa - Playing in their final home match of the 2025 season, the Clarke University women's volleyball team showed plenty of fight on the way to a five-set defeat at the hands of Graceland University at the Kehl Center on Saturday afternoon.

Prior to the start of the match, CU honored a trio of seniors in Reece Fleming, Jayden Knox, and Taryn Nolting in a pre-match ceremony for Senior Day as the three members of the Pride all spent different lengths of time part of the program with Fleming in her second season after transferring from Dawson Community College, Knox graduating early after three seasons at Clarke, and Nolting in her fourth season after joining the women's volleyball program as a walk-on in 2022.

As for the match on the court, Clarke came out on fire in the first set to a 25-14 victory behind a match-high .250 hitting percentage in the set compared to a -.045 for the Yellowjackets but the roles would be reversed in the second and third sets where GU hit over .200 and the Pride hit under .100, including a negative set in the third to set wins of 25-19 and 25-22 for Graceland.

The Pride would produce a much-needed fantastic start to the fourth set, jumping out to a 9-0 lead that would essentially carry them to the eight-point set victory in the fourth at 25-17 as the fifth set started strong as well, at a 4-0 start but the Yellowjackets rallied after the changes of sides on the court to take an 8-3 CU lead and tie the match at 9-9 on a 5-1 run, with neither team taking more than a one-point lead all the way to a match point for each team, first for GU at 14-13, then for Clarke at 15-14 following a kill from Keely Colyer and a big block assist from Amelia Driver and Auriana Villanueva.

Following a timeout from Graceland, the visitors would rattle off the next three points to win the set 17-15 and win the match 3-2 after their own clutch block on the final point of the match sealed the deal on GU's seventh win of the season.

The match leader in kills came from the Yellowjackets as outside hitter Kaci Young finished with 13 kills on 27 swings for a .333 hitting percentage as Driver was close behind with a 12-kill day and a .280 hitting percentage for her best offensive performance since the season-opener where she also had 12 kills but finished with a .360 hitting percentage back on Aug. 22.

Colyer was also in double digits for kills in the match but also had 10 attack errors for a .000 hitting percentage, Kira Finlay set a new career-high for digs in a match with 17 as she added four kills and a .125 hitting percentage, Kortney Harms was a kill shy of a double-double at nine kills and match-high 24 assists, and Kelsey NeCollins had the best hitting percentage on the team at .429 with eight kills and four total blocks for a 10.5-point day.

Knox and Fleming played key roles during their Senior Day as Knox finished with 11 digs, for her seventh match in the last nine in double digits, while adding three assists and two aces, then Fleming produced three digs that all seemingly came in key moments, and an ace subbing in to serve for one of CU's middles during their serve rotation.

Clarke women's volleyball has one more match remaining in their 2025 season when they travel to Cedar Rapids, Iowa for a Halloween Night matchup against Mount Mercy University on Friday, Oct. 31 for a 7:00 p.m. CT scheduled first serve.