Gorelina’s return to the lineup helps Syracuse into the final 8 of the NIVC

HAMILTON, N.Y. — After playing sparingly and almost exclusively back-row in the opening set Friday night against Towson, Anastasiya Gorelina was waiting for her opportunity to fully return from her right ankle injury.

With a block to close out the first set, and four kills in the first 13 points of the second set, Gorelina emphatically announced her return. In that moment, Syracuse’s leading attacker was back. The Orange attack was back to full strength.

Syracuse (22-13, 12-8 Atlantic Coast) advanced to the final eight of the National Invitational Women’s Volleyball Championship with a straight set win over Towson (27-6, 12-4 Colonial) on Friday night at Colgate University’s Cotterell Court. Now that Gorelina is back to full strength, she expects to be starting Monday night as Syracuse travels to West Virginia to take on the Mountaineers Monday night in the final eight of the NIVC.

“It was my first game back from injury so I’m excited to be able to play, and not just watch,” Gorelina said.

She turned her right ankle in the fourth set of a match on Nov. 22 against Notre Dame. Gorelina did not play in the regular season finale loss vs. Louisville, nor did she play in the postseason opening win Thursday night against Albany.

Despite being a limited factor in the opening set, Gorelina was unleashed by Yelin in the second set. She did not register any kills or attack attempts in the first set, which SU won, 25-22. She totaled four kills in the second, and four more in the third and finished with eight. Gorelina found success in a variety of attacks, using both the fastball and changeup to beat the Towson backline.

Gorelina received the set from Jalissa Trotter at the start of the second set. She used her textbook two-steps and a jump to kill the ball into the floor, giving SU its first point of the set. A few points later, Gorelina displayed her guile in tipping the ball over the Towson block. The ball floated aimlessly into the ground, just out of reach of outstretched Towson defenders, expanding the Orange lead to 7-3. After the Tigers had cut the deficit back to two, Gorelina went for power again, ending any run Towson had started and pushing the lead back to three points.

Because she had just one error and 11 attack attempts, Gorelina’s .636 attack percentage was her second-best of the season. With an attack percentage of .211 for the season entering Friday, she was over three times more efficient than average. Yelin was careful not to rush his star attacker back before she was ready, and the move paid off.

“It’s the first day she was able to play,” Yelin said. “When people are coming back from injury, it takes time to get in, you don’t want to rush.”

Yelin said he wanted Gorelina to slowly work her way back into the lineup before letting her jump and land again on the ankle. At the conclusion of the first set, she told Yelin was ready.

“He was worrying about my ankle and how I was feeling,” Gorelina said. “After the first set I told him I was ready to go to fight. He said go out and play, and I did.”

Yelin said he made some changes to the usual rotation to work her into playing more points. With some confusion amongst the SU rotation, which led to two out of rotation faults, Yelin eventually decided to return to the lineup the Orange has played for most of the season.

“We still wanted to keep her in the position to be on the outside and hit, after the first set and a half,” Yelin said. “We totally changed back to how we had been playing all season.”