JACKSONVILLE – The Jacksonville State volleyball team started fast and hardly let up en route to a 3-0 (25-14, 25-14, 25-10) sweep over visiting Tennessee Tech in the final home match of the season.
 
The dominating win moved the Gamecocks (18-17) to 6-9 in Ohio Valley Conference play, securing a spot in next week's conference tournament. It will mark JSU's 11th trip to the OVC Tournament since joining the league in 2003. The Gamecocks last brought home the title and advanced to the NCAA Tournament in 2009.
 
Sophomore Mackenzie Rombach had a terrific night leading the offense with 10 kills on 18 swings for a .500 attack clip, while recording seven blocks on the opposite side of the net. Jax State tallied nine blocks overall as a team to set a new Division I school record with 358.5 blocks in a single season.
 
Junior Allyson Zuhlke and freshman Sadie Anderson provided plenty of power as well with nine kills apiece, while freshman Kaylee Frear added seven and two blocks. The offense guided evenly by freshman tandem Rachel Perucki and Shayla Schmidt. Perucki dished 18 assists, while Schmidt had 16 for an offense that hit .337 overall.
 
Junior Hannah Kirk upped a match-best 13 balls in the win as she nears 500 digs for the season. The Katy, Texas, native will join classmates Zuhlke, Charis Ludtke and Jennifer Hart, currently sidelined with injury, as the only four Gamecocks making the second conference postseason appearance.
 
A 10-8 game in the opening set slowly turned as JSU used a 10-4 run to build a 20-12 advantage. JSU would take the set, 25-14, with the final five kills coming from different Gamecocks, including Schmidt's dump-over from the setter position.
 
The second was much the same as Jax State took a 2-0 match lead with a second-straight 25-14 decision. More than just similar scores, JSU posted identical .355 hitting marks for each of the first two sets. The third set was tied 7-7, before a TTU service error kick-started an 18-3 surge for the Gamecocks down the stretch.   
 
Head coach Terry Gamble was proud of his team's performance in a game that meant so much late in the season.
 
"I'm really happy to get the win, obviously," said Gamble. "I thought we played one of our better matches of the season tonight. And it was against another good team."
 
"I'm glad we've locked ourselves into the tournament before the final game of the season, and not having to go on the road needing that last win."
 
JSU will end its regular season on the road this Friday at UT Martin. The Skyhawks were in position to make that match determine the final tournament spot, but a loss tonight places UTM two games behind JSU in the standings with just one match left to play.