Ferris faced nationally ranked No. 19 Missouri-St.Louis and other tough competition at the Mizuno Crossover Tournament over the weekend.
The tournament was held at the Great Lakes Center in Aurora, Ill. with teams from the Great Lakes Valley Conference (GLVC) going against teams from the GLIAC. In the battle of the conferences, GLVC took the one point advantage over the GLIAC with a 23-22 score. The GLVC captured the league’s first Mizuno GLVC/GLIAC Crossover Tournament title since the event was established in 2008.
“The GLVC is extremely difficult so the competition was at a high level,” said Senior middle hitter and All-American candidate Arielle Goodson.
In the tournament, Ferris finished 1-2. Suffering losses to No. 19 Missouri-St.Louis (Mo.) and UW-Parkside (Wis.), who both had a tournament record of 2-1. Ferris opened the tournament dropping a five set match to Missouri-St.Louis 3-2. Defensively, junior libero Lisa Tobiczyk posted 25 digs in the match for the Bulldogs. Goodson helped lead the Bulldog offense with a match-high 18 kills on .400 hitting. Sophomore setter Samantha Fordyce had 42 of the Bulldogs 48 assists.
“We all played extremely hard and we played together as a team,” said Goodson. “It was a hard fought game that could have went either way.”
The Bulldogs went on to sweep their next foe Rockhurst Univeristy (Mo.) with a 3-0 victory. Junior outside hitter Ashley Huntey recorded her seventh double-double of the season by having a match-best 17 kills along with 13 digs. Ferris dominated the Hawks 56-34 in team kills. Fordyce produced a 50 assist match and added nine digs. Tobiczyk boosted the defense for Ferris adding 21 digs to lead every player. Goodson thought the team’s passing and defense against Rockhurst performed exceptionally.
“All positions helped with our win over Rockhurst,” said Goodson. “It was truly a team effort.”
In the third match against UW-Parkside (Wis.), Ferris State could not finish with a non-conference win, placing the Bulldogs 11-8 overall. The Bulldogs still possess a 7-5 GLIAC record. Goodson led all players with 20 kills while Huntey added 19 kills for the Bulldogs. The two combined for 39 of the Bulldogs 58 kills in the match.
“It was a very high-energy tournament with a lot of really close, fun volleyball matches being played,” said Tobiczyk.
As the women head into this week of practice, they are going to be focused on the things that make them successful as individuals and as a team, said Tobiczyk.
“Those are the lessons that we can look back on when we are in similar situations in the future and of course competing in the GLIAC,” said Tobiczyk.
Ferris State will return to GLIAC play Oct. 22 and 24 for its last road trip of the season and will be facing Northern Michigan University and Michigan Tech. n