Cowley volleyball team names captains for 2025 season
The defending back-to-back NJCAA DII national champion Cowley College Volleyball team has selected redshirt freshman libero/defensive specialist Kat Mizell and sophomore setter Hanna Darvas as team captains for the 2025 season.
Mizell, a native of Little Rock, Arkansas, returns for her second season after redshirting as a freshman to develop her game among the solid defenders of Cowley in 2024. Her valuable leadership skills, volleyball IQ, and defensive skills while training were key contributors to the success of the 2024 season.
"Our freshmen class in 2024 was a class of leaders and mature players who bought into our philosophy at Cowley. Kat was no exception. There just was a leadership presence about her that players respected and coaches admired," Cowley head coach Steven Gream said. "She came to our program eager to learn and was willing to redshirt in order to do it. That showed great maturity and willingness to do what was best for her and her team to give her time to grow as a college athlete. The whole season, she helped her teammates in matches and in practice by helping them with things she saw and/or while she was training with them to push them to work even harder. Her positive 'Team First' attitude really fits into the philosophy, vision, and standards of our program. Kat is one of the players who deserves a lot of credit for how close the 2024 team was. Throughout the season and this spring, she has spent a lot of time building relationships…which has earned her much respect among her fellow freshmen and sophomore teammates alike. We ask all of our players to be leaders, whether they are captains or not, and Kat did just that both on and off the court."
Darvas, a native of Diosd, Hungary, returns for her second season at Cowley after an impressive freshman season. In her freshman season, she was named NJCAA First Team All-American, AVCA First Team All-American, NJCAA All-Tournament team, First Team All-District, KJCCC First Team All-Conference, KJCCC Setter of the Year, KJCCC Freshman of the Year, AVCA Player of the Week, Two-Time NJCAA DII Offensive Player of the Week (Cowley record), Eight-time KJCCC Setter of the Week, and was named to the Cowley Invitational Tournament All-Tournament team.
"Hanna is a natural leader who has her own style of leadership that players and coaches respect. She is a mature leader who is confident, caring, calm in tough situations, reliable, and has a positive attitude. These aspects she developed throughout her career as a setter and leader of our offense. The team has a high level of trust in her, and so does our coaching staff," Gream said. "She played at a high level in Hungary and was a big part of our success in our 2024 championship run. Hanna brings that experience of not only playing at that high level but also leading at that high level to our program in 2025. She is a competitor who is always training and working on her competitive edge. She will do what it takes to win at the highest level and push others to do the same in her own way. With her being an international player in our program, she will relate greatly to the good number of international players we have."
Cowley posted a 40-0 overall record last season and went 10-0 in KJCCC play. The Lady Tigers won their fourth NJCAA National Championship (the second most all-time in the NJCAA DII), won the Plains A District championship, won the KJCCC conference championship, and have an NJCAA record 81-match winning streak.
Mizell and Darvas will lead the Lady Tigers into their season-opening tri-match action on August 21 against Southwestern College JV and Pratt Community College.
"We are very excited about the overall depth of leadership and experience we have on our roster and in the selection of these two captains for the 2025 season," Gream said. "These two ladies have both shown to be outstanding leaders while earning the respect of their teammates and the coaching staff on and off the court. They each possess different strengths that are critical to the success of the team. Both are warriors who compete, they go hard, and they want to play and win at a high level. There is no doubt they will represent our program well and help lead us to a successful 2025 campaign."