PITTSBURGH – The 25th ranked Lewis women's volleyball team opens play at the NCAA-II Volleyball Championships on Thursday taking on the 12th ranked Wheeling Jesuit Cardinals at 11 a.m. (CST) at the A.J. Palumbo Center in Pittsburgh, Pa. as part of the NCAA Division II Fall Festival.
 
The Flyers are making their third appearance at the Division II Championships and second in the last three years. Their best finish came in 1981 when they finished as national runners-up.
 
Wheeling Jesuit is making their fifth appearance at the Division II Championships with all of them coming in the last six years. The Cardinals best finish came in 2015 when they won the national championship.
 
Thursday's contest is a rematch from the 2016 Division II Championships which was won by Lewis in the quarterfinals.
 
The Flyers (28-7), seeded seventh, in the event enter Thursday's contest having won three straight and 12 of their last 13 overall. They advanced to Pittsburgh by winning the Midwest Regional defeating Rockhurst in the championship match in four sets.
 
The Lewis offense is led by seniors Elizabeth Hyland (Plainfield, Ill./Plainfield Central) and Abby Becker (Menomonee Falls, Wis./Menomonee Falls). Hyland leads the team in kills with 470 (3.70 per set) while Becker is averaging 10.72 assists per set. Alexandra Preuss (Elmhurst, Ill./York) is averaging 3.07 kills per set while Caroline Stefanon (Orland Park, Ill./Carl Sandburg) is adding 2.40 kills per set and Colleen Wilhelm (Euclid, Ohio/Lake Catholic) and Ava Venam are contributing 1.89 and 1.73 kills per set respectively.
 
Defensively, Stefanon and Venema lead the way up front averaging 1.15 and 0.78 blocks per set respectively while on the backline Ronni Katarzynski (Winfield, Ill./West Chicago) is averaging 5.29 digs per set.
 
Wheeling Jesuit, seeded second, enters the tournament with a record of 37-3 and has won 29 straight matches. The Cardinals advanced to Pittsburgh as the winners of the Atlantic Region. They overcame a 2-0 deficit to defeat Seton Hill in the regional championship match.
 
Wheeling Jesuit is led by three AVCA All-Americans in Haley Kramer, Stephanie Sylvester and Cassie Meyer. Kramer was a First Team All-American while Sylvester and Meyer were named to the second and third teams.
 
Kramer is hitting .384 this year in the middle for the Cardinals. Her hitting percentage led the Mountain East Conference (MEC) and is ranked 14th in the country. The 2018 MEC, D2CCA and AVCA Atlantic Region Player of the Year also ranks seventh in the MEC with 3.52 kills per set, while her 1.21 blocks per set is 27th in the country.
 
Sylvester is currently second in the country with 13.13 assists per set and she leads the country in total assists with 1,786 total assists. The Cardinals rank eighth in Division II with a .267 hitting percentage and lead the nation with 15.48 kills per set with Sylvester guiding the offense.
 
Meyer ranks 12th nationally wit 4.38 kills per set and she is ranked third on the team with 3.41 digs per set and has recorded a team-high 22 kill-dig double-doubles this season.