Dike-New Hartford alumni Maryn Bixby and Jadyn Petersen made their first career appearances for the Northern Iowa volleyball team over the weekend. The redshirt freshmen each started the first two matches, helping the Panthers to a 1-1 start.
At middle hitter, Bixby is tied for the team lead in blocks with six. She’s recorded 11 kills, including seven in Saturday’s 3-1 win over South Dakota State.
“Maryn just had an amazing spring, and she’s somebody that she’s such a quick learner, so it was exciting to see her even get more physical,” Head Coach Bobbi Petersen says. “She needed to get some strength, and she worked really hard this spring to do that. But she just picks up on things so extremely well blocking wise, she has a lot of really good instincts, and then she’s been working so hard to be an option in transition, and it really paid off tonight. It’s hard, we have three different setters, so that connection can really go back and forth a lot because they’re all three very different in how they set. So sometimes for middles, it can be pretty frustrating, but I thought she does a really good job of staying patient and just trusting the process and always being an option.”
Jadyn Petersen plays libero after playing outside hitter in high school. She holds the team lead in service aces with four, all which came in Saturday’s match. After the team fell 3-0 to #13 Arizona State Friday, Coach Petersen says Jadyn began to find her stride in Saturday’s win.
“I think she just really settled in tonight. I think she was pretty frustrated with, as a libero, passing and digging is what you really have. And so when one of those is struggling, it’s kind of hard to get your mind off of that. But I thought she did a really good job of coming back and not letting one part of her game feed off of the other if it wasn’t in a positive way. So I told her, ‘You bring the scrappiness, and if you can fight to do that every single night, even if you’re not making all the plays, you’re going to encourage others by being scrappy.’ It helps everyone else be scrappy as well.”
The Panthers will return to action later this week at the DoubleTree Invitational at SMU, where they’ll play Stony Brook Thursday, #11 SMU Friday and Washington on Saturday.
