Larry French

Women's Volleyball 9/17/2025 6:06:00 PM

Volleyball Starts Patriot League Play This Weekend With Two Home Matches

Patriot League Play Begins

The Loyola University Maryland volleyball team will open its 13th season of competition in the Patriot League this weekend with a pair of conference matches.
Loyola will host Holy Cross in a 6 p.m. match on Friday, September 19, before the Greyhounds play Colgate in a 4 o'clock contest on Saturday afternoon.
Both matches will stream live on ESPN+.

Last Time Out

The Greyhounds closed non-conference play with three matches in the Battle of the Beltways last week. Loyola took Georgetown to five sets on Friday night at home before the Hoyas came away with the victory. George Washington then defeated the Greyhounds in three, and George Mason scored a four-set victory on Sunday.
Kacy Sekunda led the Greyhounds with 40 kills, an average of 3.33 per set, while Ava Nepkin and Morgan Crawford had 31 and 27, respectively, for 2.58 and 2.25.
Addie Huber had seven aces in the three matches along with 53 digs for an average of 4.42 per set.

Back For A Graduate Year

Kacy Sekunda returns to the Greyhounds' lineup for the 2025 season as a graduate student after earning her bachelor's degree in. She missed all but nine matches during her sophomore season (2022) and received a medical hardship waiver to compete this year.
Sekunda finished fifth in NCAA Division I last season with nine triple doubles, and she had her first of the 2025 season on September 5 against Robert Morris before picking up a second against Georgetown. The triple-double against the Hoyas was the 15th of her career, second-most amongst active NCAA players (Jalyn Stout, Coastal Carolina, 35).
The setter-right side from Boalsburg, Pennsylvania, is Loyola's leading returning hitter, averaging 2.46 kills per set a year ago. She also averaged 4.32 assists and 3.11 digs as a senior in 2024. She had fewer than seven kills just three times in 26 matches a year ago as she racked up 244 total kills and earned All-Patriot League Second Team recognition along with Academic All-Patriot League honors.
This season, she leads the Greyhounds with 3.52 kills per set and a .221 hitting percentage entering Patriot League play.
Over the course of 322 sets in 89 career matches, Sekunda has 598 kills, 2,087 assists and 833 digs. She ranks ninth in Loyola career history in assists and enters Patriot League play 31 back of Molly Werts (2015-18) in eighth.

Freshman Digging The Playing Time

Addie Huber has been the Greyhounds' primary libero this season and is averaging 4.15 digs per set through nine matches. She has 20 or more digs in four of the last five Greyhounds matches and 12 or more in six of seven.
Huber ranks third in the Patriot League in just digs (141) and digs per set (4.15), and she is 89th and 69th nationally in those categories. Among NCAA Division I freshmen, Huber is 11th in digs per set and ninth in total digs.

The Data Science Of Volleyball

The Greyhounds have another graduate student on their roster this season, but Riley Hamilton is in only her fourth year of college. The Colgate, Wisconsin, native graduated from Loyola in May 2025 with a Bachelor of Science in data science, at the same time beginning her master's in the same field.
Hamilton was one of seven recipients of Loyola's Whelan Medal at the May 2025 Commencement, an honor given to the graduating students with the highest grade-point average. Hamilton, who graduated with a perfect 4.0, also received Loyola's honor as the female student-athlete with the highest GPA.
In three-plus years with Loyola, she has played in 72 matches and 219 sets to average 1.32 kills per set. Last year, she had a career-high 116 kills and 160 digs, and this year, she is third on the team with 1.94 kills and 2.26 digs per set.

Outside Experience

Morgan Crawford brings experience to the Loyola hitters with action in 52 matches and 167 sets over the last two seasons.
She played in all 16 regular-season Patriot League matches last year and had a season-high 11 kills in a November 1 match at Lehigh while hitting .500.
Through nine matches this year, Crawford is second on the team with 70 kills, 2.06 per set.

Nepkin Finding Her Swing

Ava Nepkin had 31 kills over Loyola's last three matches, averaging 2.58 per set against Georgetown, George Washington and George Mason to raise her season average to 1.91 per set.

Up Next

Loyola remains at home for the start of Patriot League matches, hosting Navy on Saturday, September 27 at 4 p.m. before taking on American the following day at 2 p.m.

Players Mentioned