by Eva Dean Folkert

Much has changed in college sports during the past year, but when it comes to a showdown between rivals, much feels like it has remained the same, too.

Playing against each other for the first time in exactly 17 months, the No. 15-ranked Hope College volleyball team and No. 9-ranked Calvin University faced off at Van Noord Arena in Grand Rapids in another highly anticipated match of undefeated teams.

This time, the Knights prevailed in three sets (25-20, 25-20, 25-16) over the Flying Dutch in the last match of both teams' regular seasons. 

The win moves Calvin's records to 8-0 overall and 7-0 in the MIAA. Hope fell to 6-1 in both.

Photo of McKenna Otto and Jenna Core at the net courtesy of Calvin University

Pairings for the MIAA volleyball tournament were announced after the match. Hope is seeded second and will host a first-round match against Kalamazoo College on Tuesday, April 20 at DeVos Fieldhouse.

In the first set, Hope held several early leads, the latest at 15-13, but a six-point Calvin run put the Knights up, 19-15. They would not relinquish the lead after that.

In sets two and three, Calvin led wire-to-wire; though the Flying Dutch did battle back to tie the score on several occasions in the second set, they just could not get over the tie-score hump.

"Kudos to Calvin on a on a very well-played match," said head coach Becky Schmidt. "I think that they knew that a lot of our success is going to happen when our offense is balanced. And they really did a nice job defending against our middles tonight and making it tough to score points from that part of the court. So kudos to them for playing great defense and then also taking care of the ball offensively.

"I didn't think that the scores were indicative of the quality of match that it was," Schmidt added. "I thought that they just went on a couple more three- and four-point runs at different times that gave them a little bit of a bump in the score and then allowed them to be able to play a little bit more freely, especially from the service line. So, in the third set, they were just absolutely hammering serves and getting us on our heels a little bit. And that was that was a critical part of the match."

For the match, Calvin executed seven service aces to Hope's two.

Despite the loss, senior Rose Thompson was able appreciate what it meant to still take part in a spring rivalry match in the midst of a pandemic.

"I would just say rallying everybody and appreciating the opportunity to get in the gym every day is something that I'm so thankful for as a senior," Thompson said. "I feel like I appreciate it so much more than I would have just because it is fleeting. We've had people go into quarantine this season. I was in quarantine for a while. Things can change at any moment. So just appreciating the opportunity to show up every day is really so meaningful. And I think our team has really rallied around us as seniors to try to give us the opportunity to continue to maximize this season in every way possible."

As for her fellow senior teammate, setter Adair Cutler, she sees more opportunity to come in the league tournament next week in which Calvin will be seeded first and Hope second.

"We're going to look a lot at their offensive tendencies and have our defense be ready," said Cutler. "We're just stoked to play them again. We're ready to come back."

Resilience, appreciation and tenacity like that make Schmidt proud.

"When I've got the chance to listen to seniors talk about their experience in that kind of way, it's like, yeah, we're doing exactly what we need to be doing right now," the coach said. "These women have brought a great balance of perspective and fight. That's one of the things I'm really proud of them for. Among all of the challenges of the year, they have really worked hard to fight for the stuff that they can control and to accept and get perspective on the stuff that they can't."

For the match, Hope was led at the net by junior outside hitter Ana Grunewald (Grand Rapids, Michigan/East Grand Rapids HS) who recorded 11 kills. Junior middle hitter McKenna Otto (Wheaton, Illinois / Wheaton North HS) added six.

Cutler (East Lansing, Michigan/Lansing Christian HS) doled out the most assists with 19; junior setter Tracy Westra (Clarendon Hills, Illinois/Timothy Christian HS) had 11.

On defense, freshman Maggie Wehrmeyer of Holland, Michigan (West Ottawa HS) had 18 digs while Otto contributed 10.