Arizona Wildcats head coach Rita Stubbs said that she wanted to play a team like Bowling Green that continued to fight no matter what. She certainly got that in the championship match of the National Invitational Volleyball Championship (NIVC) on Tuesday evening in McKale Center.
The Wildcats had to fight from deficits twice to win the NIVC championship in five sets (27-29, 25-23, 18-25, 25-17, 15-9), taking the title in the first five-set championship match in tournament history. They did it in front of 2,696 fans, the second-largest crowd of the season.
“I actually enjoyed it,” Stubbs said. “I didn’t necessarily want to go five, but was prepared to go five and because I think when you get a crowd in the gym like that…it was nice that it went on in the sense that it became something that they could be a part of.”
In the latter stages of the match, that crowd became louder and louder as the Wildcats rolled off two straight sets to come back from the 1-2 deficit.
Arizona looked like the far superior team to start the match. The Wildcats’ block bothered the Falcons. The home team had four blocks in the first set and took a 17-11 lead. For BGSU, that just meant that things were getting started.
The Falcons lost the first set of their first two matches in the NIVC before coming back to win. In the third match, they lost the second set but advanced. In the semifinals, they had to recover from a 0-2 deficit at St. John’s to earn the right to play for the title.
“I think we always start with belief,” said BGSU outside hitter Mia Tyler. “We talk about that a lot. If you believe you can do it, that just ups your chances so much. And I think even if we’re down one set, no matter what the score is, we always know that we can come back and win, and we do.”
BGSU not only chipped away at Arizona’s first-set lead but took a 21-20 advantage. It was tied at 22 and again at 23 before Arizona reached set point. Falcons’ star Lauryn Hovey got the kill to keep her team in the set.
The Wildcats got another set point at 25-24. This time Jessica Andrews saved it for the Falcons. Bowling Green earned their own set points at 26-25, 27-26, and 28-27. The last one was the final one. The Falcons came back from a six-point deficit to win in extra points.
“We know that they’re a team that they’ve gone to five many times before, and they are a very competitive team,” said Arizona outside hitter Jordan Wilson. “They put it all out on the floor. And so I think we came out there ready to play, but I don’t think we were fully ready. I would say we came out there with a good start, but we started to get too lax, too comfortable, and thinking that we would just be able to kind of take the lead and keep going, but they fought back really well. They’re a really good team. They’re very competitive, and playing against them, honestly, was fun. I enjoy playing against them, defending them.”
Arizona started the second set a little slower than the first, but the Wildcats started to pull away after a 6-6 tie. They won 11 of the next 14 points to lead 17-9. Even that was barely enough.
Bowling Green went on its own run to tie the second set at 22 points apiece. The Falcons couldn’t take the lead, though. Arizona evened the match with a 3-1 run to end the second frame.
The Wildcats didn’t use that to springboard the next set. The Falcons did. They never trailed in the third. The closest Arizona got was one point on three occasions. The last one was at 13-12.
BGSU used a 6-0 run to take control at 19-12. Again and again, Hovey proved that the Wildcats had no answer for her. The 25-18 loss put Arizona one set from losing on its home court and ending a 10-match winning streak.
“I think I was more angry,” Stubbs said. “I felt like we should have never put ourselves in that position. I have no problem losing to a team that beats us, but we did so many things that were out of character and just mindless errors, it was more out of frustration.”
Fifth-year opposite Jaelyn Hodge would not let the Wildcats lose. Hodge took over—and her teammates wanted her to take over. Setter Avery Scoggins made sure she did.
“I feel like I was telling Avery to send me every ball,” Hodge said. “‘I’m ready. I’m ready.’ And I think just having a setter like Avery and other positions, like Jordan, Carlie (Cisneros), the middles, they all wanted me to kind of go out and carry them. So just having a team that wants me, just being in that position is just amazing. Not selfish. I think it’s just a great, great group. Having my back, it’s amazing. And all of them coming up to me and saying, ‘This is your kill. You get this. You get this.’ So, them having my back is the best support I need.”
Hodge had two kills and two block assists to help Arizona start the fifth set 5-0. Even after BGSU’s Alexis Metille put an end to the run with a kill, Hodge was ready. She followed with two more kills, then scored another point with a part of her game that hasn’t always been the strongest. Her only ace of the match put the Wildcats ahead 8-2 in the final set.
They kept control throughout, eventually getting to championship point at 14-7 on the block by Cisneros. Bowling Green saved two match points, but the Falcons couldn’t save the next.
It took a minute to sink in.
“It took me a minute to register as it trickled out of bounds,” Stubbs said. “I didn’t know that it was over, actually.”
Hodge ended her five-year run in a Wildcat jersey with a season-high 25 kills on .339 hitting. She added an ace and four total blocks for 28 points. She also had seven digs. The kills and points led the match.
Hodge wrapped up her Wildcat career with a career-high 3.74 kills per set on .233 hitting in 2024. She will now go on to a pro career in Puerto Rico.
Scoggins ended the night with 2 kills on .400 hitting, 54 assists, 2 aces, 5 digs, and 3 total blocks. She wrapped up her freshman season with 10.46 assists per set and 1,184 total assists, just 12 fewer than Penina Snuka had as a freshman. It was the fifth-most assists by a freshman setter in program history.
Wilson had 18 kills, 2 assists, 1 ace, 8 digs, and 3 total blocks (1 solo). She accounted for 21 points. She ended her season with 3.81 kills per set, edging out Hodge for the team lead. She hit .249 this season.
Cisneros tied for the match lead with 19 digs. She added 8 kills, 2 assists, 3 aces, and 3 total blocks (1 solo), giving her 13 points.
Journey Tucker led the match with 8 total blocks (1 solo) to go with her 4 kills and 1 dig.
Hodge was named the MVP of the tournament. She was joined on the all-tournament team by teammates Scoggins and Wilson, as well as BGSU players Hovey and Tyler, Northern Colorado setter Syd Cole, and Saint John’s opposite Erin Jones.
Lead photo courtesy of Arizona Athletics