No. 1 Cards ready for SWAC opener

COEUR d'ALENE - At the start of the season, North Idaho College volleyball coach Kandice Gregorak wanted her team to be scrappy, loud, eliminate errors and be better than great at serve and serve receive so the Cardinals could keep their offense fluid.

Through the nonconference schedule, they haven't been stopped.

NIC (12-0) took over as the No. 1 team in the NJCAA polls, released Wednesday, moving from the No. 2 spot last week and the 12th spot in the preseason poll.

"I believe everyone has big hitters, so if we can remained disciplined on defense and serve receive, everything else will fall into place," said Gregorak, whose Cardinals team opens Scenic West Athletic Conference play tonight against Salt Lake Community College at 7 at Christianson Gym. "I like to run a tight ship and be better fundamentally than other teams. I stress the intangibles each day - teamwork, discipline, respect yourselves, teammates, coaches and your opponents."

Salt Lake (15-3) is ranked 7th in this week's poll.

"Salt Lake is always good and Sue (Dulaney) is a great coach," Gregorak said. "You know they will always give you their best game. We have to take care of business on our side of the net and eliminate our errors. They have an outside hitter who is the No. 1 hitter (Maddie Bushman with 201 kills) in the nation and will get her kills and they set her anywhere and everywhere."

NIC statistical leaders include: Yang Yang (141 kills), Brooklyn Bradbury (273 assists), Kaitlyn Molloy (127 digs, 33 blocks) - all of which are sophomores.

"Our sophomores set a good example from Day 1 of good attitudes, hard work, going for every ball, and buy into our system of play," Gregorak said. "The freshmen were all great high school players and the way they did things before will work for that level, however won't work at the college level. They finally bought in and listened to us and the sophomores early on."

NIC concludes the weekend by hosting Snow College on Saturday at 3 p.m.

"Every game in conference will be a battle so hopefully the kids stay focused," Gregorak said. "I know one thing, our team will give (assistant coach) Kelsey (Stanley) and myself 100 percent every game. They have all season, every game and every practice. I am hard on the girls and they always seem to find another notch to give us. They are tough kids, that's for sure. I do believe we have more in us. I've seen the lights of who we really are and we will need that for SWAC volleyball."