Parlanti named Region 24 Player of the Year, Graber and Netcott receive All-Region honors
VINCENNES, Ind. ? The honors roll in for the 2022 Region 24 Champion Vincennes University Trailblazers volleyball team, with freshman Paige Parlanti (Las Vegas, Nev.) being named Region 24 Player of the Year and sophomore Hannah Graber (Montgomery, Ind.) and freshman libero Morgan Netcott (Montague, Mich.) receiving First Team All-Region honors. Parlanti is the third Trailblazer to be named Region 24 Player of the Year since Vincennes joined the Region in 2018, joining Allison Smith (Oakland, Ill.) in 2018 and Grace Earp (Mattoon, Ill.) last season. ?This award means a lot because it shows off all of my hard work and dedication that I have put into the sport of volleyball,? Parlanti said. ?I just want to thank my coaches and teammates because they helped push me every day to be the best volleyball player I can be.?
VINCENNES, Ind. – The honors roll in for the 2022 Region 24 Champion Vincennes University Trailblazers volleyball team, with freshman Paige Parlanti (Las Vegas, Nev.) being named Region 24 Player of the Year and sophomore Hannah Graber (Montgomery, Ind.) and freshman libero Morgan Netcott (Montague, Mich.) receiving First Team All-Region honors.
Parlanti is the third Trailblazer to be named Region 24 Player of the Year since Vincennes joined the Region in 2018, joining Allison Smith (Oakland, Ill.) in 2018 and Grace Earp (Mattoon, Ill.) last season.
"This award means a lot because it shows off all of my hard work and dedication that I have put into the sport of volleyball," Parlanti said. "I just want to thank my coaches and teammates because they helped push me every day to be the best volleyball player I can be."
Parlanti burst onto the collegiate scene, recording 23 double-doubles as a freshman and leading the Blazers with 535 kills, 59 aces and being second on the team with 538 digs.
Parlanti is currently third in the nation with 633 points this season and sixth in the country with an average of 4.8 points per set as a freshman.
Parlanti also currently sits third in the country in kills and is fifth in kills per set with an average of 4.05. Parlanti is also currently 14th in the country in digs.
Parlanti set her season-high in kills with 29 in VU's five-set win at Kaskaskia and set a season-high of 29 digs against Iowa Western in the NJCAA Division I Midwest B District Tournament.
"My favorite memory from this past season was winning the Region 24 Championship and celebrating with my teammates," Parlanti added. "I absolutely loved all my teammates and the sophomores were so welcoming to all of the incoming freshmen. The relationships with all of my teammates are relationships that are going to last a lifetime and I'm so thankful for them."
"I really hope I can take the leadership skills that all of the sophomores have taught us and be just as much, if not more, welcoming and help guide the incoming freshmen to become better than us," Parlanti said.
Sophomore Hannah Graber was named First Team All-Region 24 for the second time, after earning the honor last season.
"This is very rewarding knowing that all the hard work I have put into volleyball has paid off throughout the years," Graber said. "My favorite memory from this past season was eating breakfast as a team before the Region tournament and District tournament, then all of us getting ready together after. Any time spent with the team was definitely a blast this year."
Graber helped run the Trailblazer offense along with fellow sophomore setter Josephine Mulligan (Saint John, Ind.) and still finished the season with an outstanding 654 set assists, good for 43rd in the country.
Graber recorded six double-doubles this past season, including a 27-set assist, 14-dig double-double against Lincoln Land at Parkland.
Graber's season-high for set assists came during the Owens C.C. Tournament when Graber recorded 41 set assists against Muskegon.
Graber finished with at least 20 set assists in 11 games this season, including three games of over 30 assists.
Graber closed out her Trailblazer volleyball career with 1,155 set assists, 407 digs, 116 kills and 79 aces, while leading the Blazers to a two-year record of 51-13 and an unbeaten 24-0 record against Region 24 opponents.
"I'm very proud of my fellow sophomores who definitely helped lead all the freshmen in the right direction and giving them the right mindset going into the Region tournament," Graber added. "It was very exciting knowing that we made history and went undefeated in the Region for both of my years at VU. My advice for future Trailblazer volleyball players is to work hard, don't make excuses and take care of your bodies."
Freshman libero Morgan Netcott also received First Team All-Region 24 honors Tuesday after leading the VU backrow defense all season to lead the Blazers with 697 digs.
"This means a lot to me," Netcott said. "As a libero, often we don't get very much credit in the name of awards. So, the fact that I got this and it was my freshman year makes me really happy. I was unsure if I wanted to play at the collegiate level and this has helped to show that what I do doesn't go unnoticed."
"Obviously, there is no way that this could be possible if I didn't have such a strong team around me," Netcott added. "Without the block doing what they are supposed to and the rest of our team doing their jobs extremely well, there is no way that I would have been able to do what I do as effectively."
Netcott came into her own defensively, recording 20 or more digs in 16 games this season and 30 or more in four, including a season-high 42 digs at Wallace State.
Netcott finished her freshman campaign with 697 digs, which currently puts her fifth in the nation and 11th in the country with 5.24 digs per set, along with 60 set assists and 18 aces.
"My favorite memory from this past season has to be at the Wallace State tournament when the whole team was dancing in our warmups and we all put gold glitter spray in our hair," Netcott said. "We had so much fun jumping around and laughing as a team and then we went and played five of our best sets of the season. Being on this team, there was such a strong sense of companionship and we always played our best when we were having fun together."
"This season I really worked on improving my mental game as opposed to just my physical skills," Netcott added. "What I learned the most is that if you have a good team around you, everyone wants you to succeed. No one is rooting for you to mess up and when you do mess up, no one is mad at you."
"To win a championship the entire team needs to know that they belong and to feel that confidence that the rest of the team has in them," Netcott said. "That is exactly the case in our team and for that I couldn't be more grateful."
The Trailblazers, guided by these three student-athletes, finished the 2022 volleyball season with a 29-9 record and an undefeated 12-0 record against Region 24 opponents for the second consecutive season on their way to winning back-to-back Region 24 Championships.
ALL-REGION 24 TEAM
PLAYER OF THE YEAR: PAIGE PARLANTI – VINCENNES
FIRST TEAM
HANNAH GRABER – VINCENNES
Lexi Kosmopolis – John A. Logan
Riley Kleber – Kaskaskia
Ashton Hirst – John A. Logan
Madison Watret – Lake Land
MORGAN NETCOTT – VINCENNES
SECOND TEAM
Kenadi Barriger – Kaskaskia
Madison Hill – Wabash Valley
Gabyrela Castro de Jesus – Lake Land
Ashtyn Barton – John A. Logan
Brianna Hewing – Lake Land
Myah Helmkamp - Kaskaskia