EAST PEORIA, Ill. – Making their third postseason appearance in the past three seasons under the direction of head coach Andy Halaz, the fourth-seeded Missouri S&T volleyball team took the court at the Eastside Centre against fifth-seeded Quincy in the second match of the day at the 2021 Great Lakes Valley Conference Volleyball Championship. The Miners (19-11) held leads in each of the first two sets of the but were unable to close out in the late going against the Hawks (18-12), who led from start to finish in set three to advance to the tournament semifinals in straight sets (23-25, 24-26, 18-25).
 
Shelby Ply (Rolla, MO/Rolla) opened the afternoon with a kill to give S&T the first point of the afternoon as the Miners led through the early stages of the set. After battling back-and-forth point for point, Missouri S&T managed to gain some breathing room on a 5-2 run leading 8-7 to make it 13-9 behind kills from Ply, Payton Gannaway (Lawrence, KS/Lawrence Free State) and Jordan Burton (Olathe, KS/Olathe South) along with a Hannah Merjil (Bakersfield, CA/Garces Memorial) ace. QU never let S&T pull ahead by more than four however, as they fought their way back to tie the set at 16 before taking the lead for the first time on the following point. After a brief exchange of the lead, Quincy regained the advantage with back-to-back aces to make it 20-18. Following a timeout, the Miners managed to get within two at 24-22 behind the All-GLVC trio of Burton, Gannaway and Ply but couldn't quite complete the rally as QU took the opener 25-23.
 
The Hawks dashed out to a 3-0 lead early in set two before kills from Gannaway and Burton along with a Kiernan O'Boyle (Kansas City, MO/St. Teresa's Academy) block stopped QU's momentum cold and evened the set at 3-3. Quincy regained the lead for a moment before a 3-0 Miner run gave them their first lead of the frame at 6-4. S&T maintained the lead as the points rolled on, leaning heavily on Gannaway and Ply to push the advantage to six at 22-16. It was then that the Hawks got going and scored the next seven points to regain the lead 23-22 before stumbling as they looked to close out the set, committing a pair of attack errors to put the Miners back on top 24-23. Coming out of a timeout, Quincy recorded a pair of blocks against Gannaway before collecting a kill to take the set 26-24 to lead the match 2-0.
 
Quincy scored the first two points in the final set of the day as S&T looked to rally and force the match to a fourth set. An Abigail Widiker (Hammond, WI/Saint Croix Central) kill and a QU error briefly evened the set at 2-2 before the Hawks managed to open things up with a 5-1 run to lead 8-3. A kill from Ply and two more errors made it 8-6 but that was as close as S&T was able to get as the #5 seed was able to pad their lead and pull away to as much as an eight-point advantage at 24-16. A service error and a kill from Madelyn Mason (Mount Horeb, WI/Mount Horeb) allowed the Miners to get a pair of points late but a comeback was not in the cards as QU took the set 25-18 to advance to face top-seeded Lewis on Saturday afternoon.
 
Gannaway led the way for S&T and finished with a double-double of 14 kills and 11 digs. Ply hit .579 for the match with 12 kills while Burton added nine. Merjil recorded 34 assists and seven digs to go with three blocks while O'Boyle was in on five blocks, including a solo effort. Meiko Pearson (Overland Park, KS/Blue Valley Northwest) added a team-high 14 digs with Widiker adding nine and a pair of aces.
 
S&T, who was ranked ninth in the latest regional rankings, will now await the result of the GLVC Tournament to see if they are able to make an appearance in the 2021 NCAA Division II Midwest Regional.