Rams Score First Sweep of the Season over UNLV

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By: Braidon Nourse

FORT COLLINS, Colo. – Emily Kohan shook hands with and hugged one of her childhood best friends, first-year head coach Malia Shoji, just before Colorado State volleyball's Ag Day match against Mountain West leaders UNLV. They've been dear friends pretty much their whole lives, but for the very first time, they shared the floor on opposite benches head coaching against each other.

From Fowler, Colorado, a small town near Pueblo with a population of just more than 1,000, the two grew up with both of their moms as teachers. They met in first grade, took their first skiing lessons together and eventually were coached as club volleyball players for the first time by Shoji's dad.

Agriculture and CSU have always played a big role in Kohan's life growing up, too. Her grandfather played football for the Rams; her dad attended CSU as well, and works as a rancher to this day. She grew up in a Colorado State agricultural household while paving her own path as a volleyball maestro with one of her best friends.

Those two worlds collided in the most perfect way at Moby Arena Saturday, with both families in the stands to witness their first matchup at the helm of their respective programs.

Any love lost after Kohan's team swept Shoji's squad, 25-21, 25-21, 25-21?

"We've grown up through volleyball since first grade, so it's really cool that we're head coaches now in the same year, … It's really fun for it to be Ag Day, to get to (coach against) one of your best friends, families in the stands, it's really cool," Kohan said. "No (love lost), but we've got to go (to Las Vegas) and they will be anxious, I'm sure, to avenge the loss. I think it's a really good data point for our team to move forward through conference knowing we can play against some of the top teams."

The Rams posted one their best first sets of the season in terms of hitting percentage (.500) on the way to hitting a season-high .473 for the match. That kind of productivity to start could rattle any opponent, including the Rebels, who were last year's Mountain West regular season champions.

Against that caliber of team, which was 3-0 in conference play before Saturday with the 2022 conference player of the year — Isabel Martin — still on the roster, all cylinders had to fire from first serve on both sides of the ball. One of the secrets to stopping Martin, the Rams hadn't worked on until just a day prior to facing her: sending three players to block her shots.

"We just practiced triple blocking yesterday, we'd never done it before" Kohan said, "So the fact they did it so well after one day of practice is really cool. They were able to evolve and execute it, and I mean it's three big people in front of you and (Martin) hadn't seen that all year. She still had a really great night, she's a very talented player, but we minimized her impact on the game."

Offensively, the stellar hitting percentage was the result of dispersing the attack effectively. Setter Emery Herman had 27 assists to five different players, all of whom recorded five kills or more. Herman recorded five kills of her own, totaling six Rams with at least that figure.

Outside hitter Malaya Jones led the way for the Rams with nine kills. Kennedy Stanford and Naeemah Weathers tallied eight each. Jones hitting a remarkable .412 herself, her performance was the culmination of her progression in both smarts and physical ability.

".412 is unbelievable for (Jones') position, especially, and I believe a lot of her kills came from the back row," Kohan said. "When I think about where she was the most terminal was when she was swinging behind the 10-foot line. That's been a huge development in her offense this year, she can get up and swing from the back row, not just the front row."

For Jones, the sweep coupled with the balanced attack and execution of their game plan was most satisfying, citing the team has worked their butts off in preparation for their past two matches.

From her perspective, they had to work hard and be smart about hitting around or over the Rebels' blockers. She executed those things well, made evident by her statline.

"I think it was just being relentless and hitting with high hands," Jones said. "They have a really strong block, one of the best in the conference, so we really had to find those edges and also just play the entire point.

"I was just seeing what was the most open and being really smart with my shots. I think that's something I've been evolving all season, just being smarter."

On a day when every detail seemed to be right for Kohan and her team, it was only fitting her team would combine for the kind of performance coaches dream about — the first sweep of the season, a season-best in team hitting percentage and six players registering five or more kills, all in just three sets.

Maybe the stars did align for a once-in-a-lifetime experience for the first-year head coach. It was the type of efficiency which Kohan herself said isn't sustainable over the span of a season. But it was still a day she, along with her childhood companion on the opposite end of the court, will remember for a long time.

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