As injuries have mounted on Allen Community College’s volleyball team this season, the Red Devils have had to adapt on the fly.
The latest hit was a knee injury that will sideline sophomore outside hitter Thauany Mendes for the rest of the year.
Rather than mope, the Red Devils have adopted the “next man up” approach.
“At the end of the day, there are no excuses,” Allen head coach Maria Aikins said. “You’ve gotta get it done.”
That’s precisely what Allen did Wednesday, steamrolling past visiting Hesston in straight sets, 25-15-, 25-18 and 25-17, to improve to 13-5 on the season and 3-2 in Jayhawk Conference play.
“We’ve had a lot of players step up in new positions they hadn’t played before,” Aikins said.
One such example is 6-foot freshman Yolaine Luthi, who has taken on a bigger role in the lineup.
“We asked her because she’s athletic,” Aikins said. “And she did what she needed to do to help the team. It was nice to see her step up in that role.”
Luthi racked up five solo blocks, six total, and had a pair of kills against the Larks.
Allen trailed only once all night, in the opening moments of the first set, before turning a 3-1 deficit into an 8-4 lead. Hesston stayed within 13-12 before Allen ended things with a 12-3 run.
That spurt continued in the second set. Allen scored the first four points, then responded after a lengthy video review paused the action for a while.
Allen rattled off six straight points after the delay, eventually opening up a 15-3 advantage.
Hesston responded with its best run of the night, eventually closing to within 23-18, but it was too little, too late.
Allen led the entire way in the final set as well, closing the match with a 7-2 run.
Le Roy native Josie Weers paved the way for the victors, blasting home a whopping 16 kills in 33 chances, for a .424 kill percentage. For comparison, Hesston was successful on .044 of its kill attempts.
