The volleyball team rounded out its season this past Friday with an invigorating run in the Great American Conference (GAC) tournament.
The Lady Bisons defeated Ouachita Baptist University three sets to one in a first round matchup. However, Arkansas Tech University felled the Bisons’ tournament hopes and brought the 2014 season to a close with a three to one defeat in the semi-finals. The loss left the team with an overall 20-9 record and a 10-4 conference record.
The Lady Bisons won seven of their 14 GAC games three sets to zero. The team held the 4th slot in conference ranking by the season’s end. As a team, the Lady Bisons smashed home 1,420 kills compared to their opponents’ 1,259, and accumulated a total of 260 more points than their competitors.
Despite the coveted GAC trophy slipping away, two-time All-GAC recipient senior Taryn Eubank was in high spirits.
“We went out fighting, and we played our hardest,” Eubank said.
She boasts an average of 10.09 assists this season, which earned her third rank in the GAC.
Outside hitter junior Molly Howard was also proud of her team’s achievements this season, as well as their exit from the tournament.
“Overall, making it to the semi-finals and playing our last game with all our hearts is nothing to be sad about,” Howard said. “We didn’t do anything wrong, we didn’t do anything halfway in our last game, and I think that, overall, our season was good.”
With the close of another season comes the curtain call for several of the Lady Bison’s valuable players. Four seniors played their final match against Tech, including Erica Heim, Liv Savage, Marindia Turner, and Eubank. Eubank described her time on the team with pride, particularly in the fashion they finished this season. Heim transferred to Harding University in 2013 from Drury University, where she accumulated over 200 digs and 200 kills each. Turner consecutively accumulated the Academic All-GAC award twice and bagged over 600 career kills. Savage reports 2nd Team All-GAC election in 2012 and 2013 and 1st team in 2014, as well as ranking fifth in Harding history at blocks per set. Eubank touts two Academic All-GAC awards, a place on the 2014 All-GAC team, and2,074 career assists.
There are now some “big shoes to fill,” according to Head Coach Meredith Fear. “(The seniors) provided great leadership and filtered an atmosphere of unity,” Fear said.
But Fear said she is encouraged by the returning talent and the skilled freshman class. Howard, who will be a senior in the fall, remains optimistic for the brand new team.
“We’re going to have to build each other up,” Howard said, “but if we work really hard we’re going to be a really good team.”
