This Week's Matches
Game Notes	Loyola
Opponent	Duke Blue Devils
Location	Durham, N.C. | Cameron Indoor Stadium
Getting There	Directions
Date	Thursday, August 31, 2023
Time	6:30 p.m.
Online Media	Live Stats | ACCNX
Opponent	West Virginia Mountaineers
Location	Durham, N.C. | Cameron Indoor Stadium
Getting There	Directions
Date	Friday, September 1, 2023
Time	4:00 p.m.
Online Media	Live Stats
Opponent	North Carolina Tar Heels
Location	Chapel Hill, N.C. | Carmichael Arena
Getting There	Directions
Date	Saturday, September 2, 2023
Time	6:00 p.m.
Online Media	Live Stats | ACCNX

Week Two On The Road

• Loyola University Maryland volleyball will play its second weekend of the season, heading on the road to the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area of North Carolina for a trio of matches.
• The Greyhounds will start their trip on Thursday, August 31, with a 6:30 p.m. contest at Duke University in Cameron Indoor Stadium. The following afternoon, Loyola will play a neutral-site game at Duke against West Virginia University, starting at 4 o'clock.
• Loyola wraps up its trip on Saturday with a 6 p.m. game at the University of North Carolina.

Looking Back

• Loyola opened the year with a 2-1 record at the Blue Hen Invitational, falling in four in the opening match to host Delaware before beating Niagara and Robert Morris in the last two contests.
• Lauren Link led the Greyhounds with 35 kills, an average of 4.09 per set, in the opening weekend, while Kacy Sekunda added 32 (2.91), and Kennedy Stevens had 23 (2.09). Sekunda had a team-best .343 hitting percentage, Stevens swung at a .321 clip, and Link hit .257.

Conference Recognition

• Kacy Sekunda was named the Patriot League Player of the Week on August 29 after leading the Greyhounds in the first weekend of the season. Playing as a right-side hitter and setter, Sekunda averaged 2.91 kills, 5.0 assists and 2.36 digs in 11 sets that covered three matches.
• She had the first triple-double since 2015 when she had 11 kills, 24 assists and 11 digs in the tournament's finale against Robert Morris. Her triple-double was the first for Loyola since Molly Werts recorded one, also in a four-set win, on September 11, 2015, against Manhattan.

Link-ing The Kills

• Lauren Link broke out as a sophomore outside hitter for the Greyhounds in 2021, finishing second on the team with 3.24 kills per set, a mark good for fifth-best in the Patriot League. She had 17 matches with 10 or more kills, including each of the Greyhounds' last 13 contests. During that stretch, she averaged 14.1 kills per match and 3.6 kills per set.
• Last season, Link moved into a role as the Greyhounds' primary option on the outside, and she had the stats to back it up. In 24 matches, she put away 406 kills, an average of 4.56 per set. Link's 4.56 kills per set were tops in the Patriot League and ninth in the NCAA. She had seven matches with 20 or more kills, 16 with 15-plus, and she has put away 11 or more kills in all but two of the 25 matches Loyola has played this year.
• To start the 2023 season, she has three matches with 10 or more kills and one with 20-plus, a season-high 21 coming against Robert Morris.

Debut Action

• Three players made their debuts in Loyola uniforms last weekend with transfers Bryanne Soares and Kennedy Stevens playing their initial matches for the Greyhounds along with freshman Morgan Crawford.
• Stevens, a transfer from Hofstra, started all three matches and had 23 kills (2.09 per set) and tied for the team lead with three aces and seven total blocks. Soares, who previously played at Oral Roberts, played as a 6-2 setter and dished out 57 assists (5.18) to go with 20 digs (1.82) and three aces. Crawford made her collegiate debut and started all three matches, putting away 17 kills (1.55).

Back In Action

• A couple of key players for the Greyhounds are back in the rotation after missing the latter half of the 2023 season due to injury. Caitlin Churney returns to the court for Loyola where she averaged 2.02 kills per set in 42 frames last year while adding 0.48 blocks.
• Kacy Sekunda is also slated to return to the Greyhounds' lineup at setter. She played in the first nine matches of the 2023 season and posted 299 total assists, 8.79 per set,  along with 29 kills and 17 total blocks.

Libero Launch

• Rose McDermott saw her first-ever action as the Greyhounds libero during the season's first weekend, and she led the team in digs (45) and digs per set (4.09).
• Last year, McDermott saw extensive action as a back-row sub and finished with 183 digs, an average of 2.20 per set.
• Leah Hunter was the Greyhounds' back-row sub off the bench in the first weekend of the year, and she finished with 17 digs for an average of 1.89 per set. Hunter's dig total already far exceeded her freshman-year total of two from the 2022 campaign. She had a career-best 12 digs against Robert Morris.

Up Next

• Loyola makes its home debut on Tuesday, September 5, with a 6 p.m. match against Coppin State University.