>> GEORGIA COLLEGE
Georgia College & State University (GCSU) volleyball finished its overall 2022 fall season 11-19 and 7-8 in Peach Belt Conference (PBC) play.
Looking back, the Bobcats’ fall season represented their best PBC finish since going 8-4 in a 2017 campaign. Georgia College highlighted its season with big wins over conference runner-up USC Aiken and a win over the tournament champion Flagler College.
GCSU kicked off conference play in mid-December against the Pacers of USC Aiken and took the match in three sets.
Buckhead native Rachel Machovec highlighted the hitting with nine kills while adding three blocks and eight digs to her defensive effort. Alanis Bernis led the dig effort with 19 for the Bobcats.
The next big win for GCSU came in early October with a nail-biter at USC Aiken that went into five sets. Georgia College took sets one, three, and five with Machovec leading the charge, knocking down 18 kills with Allatoona’s Callie Miller right behind with 15 kills. Machovec nabbed a double-double in the contest adding 18 digs to her credit, while Bernis led the dig effort with 26 digs.
To wrap up the home slate for the Bobcats they started out a two-day stay in the Centennial Center with a win over the Flagler Saints. GCSU again stretched the match to five sets taking two, four, and five. Not often in the game of volleyball do people see a player with 20-plus kills and digs but in this contest against her alma mater, Machovec did just that. She had 20 kills and 21 digs, while Miller contributed 10 kills to the offense. Bernis capped off the defense with 26 digs.
Throughout the season, several players contributed to the success of the Bobcats, especially in conference play.
Senior setter Emily Long was the assist leader for the Bobcats with 523 last season, but also demonstrated excellent defense, adding 261 digs to her season totals. The leading defender for GCSU was the libero Bernis, who had an impressive 497 digs.
Outside hitter Machovec was a large part of the season’s success as she led the team in kills with 265. She also showed how versatile she was by having 341 digs good for the second-best on the team.
Another big aspect for the Bobcats was the addition of middle blocker Brooke Roberts, a Snead State Community College transfer. Roberts came into the program after finishing 17th nationally in blocks per set with 1.17 and 128 total blocks. She broke the single-season block record at GCSU and the single-game block record with 12 blocks against Lander University. Bobcats head coach Gretchen Krumdieck did a great job in the off-season utilizing the transfer portal and getting some good talent like Roberts. She also picked an in-conference transfer, Miranda Hardin, a defensive-minded player who mostly played in the role of serving specialist as she had 16 service aces to her credit this season.
“One thing that played into our success is that there were so many new girls that were willing to buy into making the program as best as it could be and coach could mold this team almost from scratch,” Hardin said.
The Bobcats will kick off their off-season workouts when then return from the holiday break in January.