Women’s Volleyball and Men’s Soccer Bring Back a Winning Culture to Gettysburg
Women’s volleyball (Photo Luca España/The Gettysburgian)
By David Goldman, Staff Writer
After over a year without live sports on the Gettysburg College campus, the Bullets are back. Women’s volleyball and men’s soccer shined on the court and on the pitch, as both teams found themselves deep in the postseason. They brought much needed spirit and excitement back to Gettysburg, where students were eager to return to normalcy.
Women’s Volleyball
Head Coach Leah Bernier has served the Women’s Volleyball team for 12 seasons. Bernier has seen lots of success throughout her time at Gettysburg. She has posted an overall record of 164-115 and has taken her Bullets to the playoffs on five separate occasions. This year, Gettysburg volleyball dominated the competition and earned a spot in the postseason. With a 15-9 overall record and a 6-4 conference mark, the Orange and Blue saw contributions up and down their whole roster.
“Everybody did their job,” Bernier said about the team’s performance. Many of the players on the team competed in their first NCAA season, as the team was composed of twelve underclass students and only five upperclass students.
Bernier embraced this challenge and said that one of the most rewarding parts of the season was seeing her players grow as athletes and humans, and “watching them realize they were good when it all came together at the end.”
The end did seem to be the most important part of the season for the Bullets. They won six of their last seven regular season games before they headed off to the Centennial Conference Tournament. A clean sweep of Franklin & Marshall gave the group some momentum going into a matchup with the number one ranked team in the region in Johns Hopkins. Gettysburg forced Johns Hopkins to play its first five-set match against a conference rival in three years, but the Blue Jays were up to the task. They defeated the Bullets and ended their season, but Bernier said that there were many positives to take away, some of which did not even have to do with the actual talent on the court.
“The energy behind this team was a joy to be around, and our bench culture was really good,” said Bernier. “We started changing the culture within the last few years to make sure we were paying attention to that aspect of the game.”
Libero Chelsea O’Leary ’24 attested to this impactful culture change. “Our overall team mindset was shifted towards winning and we are definitely a hungrier team.” O’Leary provided reliable defense all season and recorded over 400 digs.
With such a young team, the bar can only go up from here. Defensive specialist Callie Pidoriano ’24 is eager to see what the team can accomplish next year when they return most of the same roster, and she has the utmost confidence in their ability to repeat success. “I definitely think you’ll be seeing us in the conference championships next season.”
Pidoriano was converted from setter to defensive specialist this season and thrived under the role with close to 200 digs on the year.
The volleyball squad also saw an incredible season performance from outside hitter Zanze Kuba-McCoy ’23, who was named to the American Volleyball Coaches Association Division III All-America Team. Kuba-McCoy is the first to achieve national recognition at Gettysburg in 17 years. She averaged 3.88 kills per set and finished ninth overall in the Centennial conference with 3.17 digs per set.
The 2021 Bullets volleyball season was a success, and they look forward to building on this in the offseason.
Men’s soccer (Photo Luca España/The Gettysburgian)
Men’s Soccer
Over on Clark Field, the men’s soccer team also marched their way into the playoffs after an impressive 13-6-2 overall finish, with a 5-3-1 conference record. Coach Mark Mettrick led this squad through the extremely difficult competition of the Centennial Conference. Mettrick began his eighth season as head coach this year. His career highlight was the 2019 season where his group qualified for the NCAA Division III Championship for the first time in 18 years, so Mettrick is no stranger to successful soccer programs. In fact, Coach Mettrick is now only three wins away from winning 300 games in his career, 74 of them earned at Gettysburg.
When asked about the drive of this team, Mettrick emphasized the work they put in and the leadership that emerged prior to the season starting. “I think the work we did in the offseason was essential to our success.” Like all college teams, the soccer squad took on the challenges that COVID-19 presented, but those players who were able to be on campus in the spring “set a great example in terms of strength and conditioning,” which carried over into the season.
Mettrick mentioned that COVID-19 was not the only challenge this team faced, also speaking on the many injuries his players suffered. This meant that players had to step up in crucial roles and be comfortable in uncomfortable situations. In addition, Mettrick highlighted that despite how difficult his team’s schedule was this season, the Bullets still found ways to win games. Gettysburg scored the most goals in the Centennial Conference, “which is one of the top soccer conferences in Division III.”
Not only did this team click on the field, but goalkeeper Kevin Muhic ’24 mentioned that the men were connected off the field as well. “We are all best friends and get along very well.” Muhic went on to talk about the strong support of his teammates, by saying that “guys not playing always supported the guys on the field.” The goalkeeper racked up 82 saves this year, which accounted for his 0.752 save percentage.
The Gettysburg team performed well in the playoffs when they knocked off Swarthmore in overtime and then defeated highly ranked Johns Hopkins. The Bullets lost to Washington College in the Centennial Conference championship, but they were not ready to let their season end just yet. The team eagerly awaited the announcement of the 64-team field that would be able to participate in the NCAA Division III Tournament. Gettysburg heard its name called and instantly began to prepare for their trip to Cortland, New York, where they were to face off against Kean University.
The Orange and Blue came up short in the first round of the tournament despite a career-high 9-save game from Muhic. Now the team must look forward to next year, where success is not guaranteed according to Mettrick.
“Every year is different,” he said. “We will continue to play a nationally competitive schedule and try and compete on the national level of Division III soccer.”
Men’s soccer gave sports-deprived Bullets fans something to cheer about after a long-awaited return.
This article originally appeared on pages 22–23 of the December 6, 2021 edition of The Gettysburgian’s magazine.
