SEANTOBIA – History was made at Howard Coliseum on Sunday afternoon as the #16 Northwest Mississippi Community College volleyball team (40-0) took down #15 Lurleen B. Wallace Community College (33-2) in a four-set thriller, earning the Gulf South District Championship in the process and becoming the first team in Mississippi history to qualify for the NJCAA Division II National Championship.
"I'm just so proud," Head Coach Allyson Burchyett said. "We took care of business to be able to host the Region 23 Tournament, and then to be able to play at home against the Alabama winner made all the difference. The crowd was great, the bench was energized, and it was just a really good environment to play in."
She added that being the first really is a big deal, and she is proud it was the Rangers that were able to be the ones to break through the ceiling.
"We've been pushing for community college volleyball for a long time, well before the seven years that we started. It's been a growth, and we will have 13 teams in Mississippi next year, so it's really satisfying to see the growth. And obviously we are going to compete with one another, but there is also a professional level where we want each other to be successful when we are competing against different states."
Sophomore middle Ariana Woods said it's not just that way from a coach's perspective. The players also feel the same pride in representing the state.
"It's special, the fact that we are 40-0 and we have made it so far, and people didn't expect a small-town team from Mississippi to be able to make it so far, so the fact that we are going to nationals, I think it just sets a tone that we are ready to win and take this thing home."
The Rangers cruised early in the match, taking the opening sets 25-14 and 25-18 before hitting a speed bump in the third when the Saints capitalized on a slow start from Northwest, taking the set 26-24. The Rangers would rally back and finish the match in the fourth, outlasting Lurleen 25-22 to capture the crown.
With the victory, the Rangers were also able to keep their undefeated season going, becoming the first team from the state to eclipse the 40-win plateau and remaining one of two undefeated teams in the country, joining #1 Kirkwood Community College (33-0) as the only two teams that remain perfect entering the national tournament.
"It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, especially with a two-year school," sophomore setter Chloe Rodriguez said. "To be the first from Mississippi is a great accomplishment and to add this to our list is nice."
The match opened up with the Rangers bursting out to a 4-0 lead, led by a pair of service aces from Reese McIntosh. The Saints would trim the lead back to 4-3, but that was the closest they would get thanks to a Woods service run that pushed the lead all the way to 11-3, highlighted by another two aces from the sophomore middle.
"It was important, especially against this team," Woods said of the hot start. "They wanted it just as bad as we did, so I knew as someone who could be inconsistent, that was where it was going to count in this game. It was going to come down to who could go on the longest runs and make the best of them."
Northwest made the rest of the set a matter of mathematics, never letting the lead shrink below seven, and growing it to as high as 11 several times on the way to a 25-14 win.
The second set was a bit of a different story, as Lurleen rallied and established an early 4-1 lead that would grow to 13-7 by the time the middle of the match arrived. Burchyett held off on calling a timeout, and her faith in her team was rewarded as the Rangers ran off the next eight points to flip the momentum and take a 15-13 lead on another McIntosh service run.
Burchyett said there is a level of trust in this team that allows her to leave it to them in tough moments.
"I've always believed in their ability to come back no matter what the score says. We needed to clean things up, but we were making errors, so I just wanted them to hang in there, and they did. They bounced back, got the momentum, and then they finished strong."
"I feel like our team is very close, and we can go to the middle and say, let's calm down and play our game, and let's get through this," Rodriguez said of the moment. "That was a big thing we said at the beginning of the game was to play our game. We don't need to play theirs, and if we continue to do that, it was going to work."
Lurleen would never tie or lead again, only finding the ability to close it to one twice at 15-14 and 19-18 on the way to a 25-18 win for the Rangers and a 2-0 lead in the match.
It seemed like the Rangers were about to close the door on the match in the opening salvos of the third set, pushing ahead 6-0 out of the gate, but little by little, the Saints were able to find their footing, eventually going on their first big run of the day, flipping an 11-6 score into a 14-11 lead on a service push by Abigail Wiggins.
Northwest tied the match at 18, 19, 22, 23, and 24, but never could take the lead thanks to a standout performance from Jadyn Britton, who had eight kills in the set on the way to 21 in the match, keeping the visitors alive with a 26-24 win in extra points.
"Britton was winning points," Burchyett said, giving credit to the Saints' outside attacker. "She was going around our block, through our block, over our block, and they were getting her the ball to their credit."
Both sides came out swinging in the fourth with the match on the line, and it was the Saints who again took the early advantage, increasing the lead from a 4-4 tie in the early going to a 13-9 lead in the middle.
The Rangers looked to Gonzalez to take the lead from there, reeling off three consecutive kills, flipping the lead to Northwest at 16-14. Lurleen would tie the match at 16 and again at 19, but Northwest held them away from the lead both times, going ahead 24-10 before another kill from Gonzalez slammed the door shut on a 25-22 win.
Down the stretch, it turned into a battle of the top hitters on each team, and Gonzalez said she loves to accept those challenges personally.
"Every time a team has a dominant outside, I make it my own thing to be more dominant," she said. "When they score, I have to score. It's always a one-up type of thing, and even if it's not, you always have to show them that they can get their stuff, but ours is even better."
Gonzalez was the leader for the Rangers' offense all night, capping off the final home match of the year with a career-best 26 kills, setting a new record for the program, surpassing Kapria Manning's 24-kill match against Itawamba in 2021. She also had 14 digs in the match for a double-double, all while hitting .455.
"I didn't even know I was doing that," Gonzalez added. I just wanted the game to end, and after the third set, I was really mad because they had played good, but I really wanted to take that in a sweep, because we had our chances. And it's not even just me. When we all are playing good, it's just easy to score."
Both Valerie Hurdle and Woods would join her in double figures with 10 each, and Woods added six blocks, including one solo with five assists, and was a part of every block for the Rangers on the night.
"I owe a lot of that credit to my pins," Woods said of the blocking success that has led her to 122 blocks this year, and now over 200 in her career. "They set up our blocks really well, and we talk a lot in between plays. We just try to figure out what the best possible position to set up."
Rodriguez and Dallas White handled the offense with great efficiency, tallying 30 and 18 assists, respectively, on the way to 54 of the team's 56 kills. Rodriguez also added four block assists.
"It's nice to have setters that trust that you can score. The sets are good no matter what, and even if you have one that's off, the next is right where you want it. They adjust well, and they make really good opportunities for all hitters," Gonzalez said.
As a team, Northwest hit .215 and had nine aces, with four each from McIntosh and Woods, and had 69 digs and a serve receive percentage of .986, only giving up one ace to the Saints.
"Our team is so well balanced, it could be any player," Burchyett said. "It's not the same player every time. We have such a balanced offense and defense. It just keeps the other team guessing where the ball is coming from, and we took advantage of the opportunities we had."
The win advances the Rangers to the NJCAA Division II National Championship, beginning on November 18 through the 21, for the first time in program history, and for the first time in MACCC history, there will be a team competing in the national field as well. That isn't something that the team took lightly either.
"I'm excited to see the competition," Woods added. "No one has seen our best, and I'm excited to see how much better we are going to get and how much more we will step up to the occasion."
For Burchyett, it's another chance to hit the road with the team and spend more time with this close-knit group, and while they are there, she is hoping to make some noise.
"I'm looking forward to the road trip with my girls, having new experiences, and representing our state in Cedar Rapids. I think that's a big deal for us to go there and prove that we belong. That we aren't just happy to be there. We want to prove we belong."
Northwest will find out their seeding this week during the selection show from the NCJAA. Keep up with news and scheduling by visiting nwccrangers.com or by following along on Ranger social media accounts.
