LAWRENCE, Kan. – The Kansas Volleyball team earned seven Big 12 postseason awards, the league announced Tuesday, highlighted by Coach Ray Bechard’s fifth Big 12 Coach of the Year honor and Topeka native Camryn Turner being named Big 12 Setter of the Year.
Turner was also named First Team All-Big 12, along with junior Ayah Elnady and graduate Reagan Cooper, while junior London Davis received Second Team All-Big 12 honors. Freshman Raegan Burns was named to the Big 12 All-Rookie Team.
“We’re excited about all of the postseason awards,” said Bechard. “I think that’s just a reflection of Roster 19 and this group, how hard they’ve collectively worked and the result of a great, great season. There have been great individual and team performances within that.”
Bechard led the Jayhawks to a 23-5 regular season record, including a 14-4 conference clip, which put Kansas in second place in the Big 12. Kansas recorded four ranked wins during this time, with two over then-No. 20 Houston, one over then-No. 23 Baylor and then-No. 13 BYU on the road, being the only team to win in Provo this year. The 14 wins are the most in conference play since 2016 when Kansas had 15 conference wins and won its first-ever Big 12 title.
Kansas also qualified for its 12th NCAA Tournament in program history and will be making its third consecutive appearance. All 12 appearances have been under Coach Bechard, with the first coming in 2003. The three straight trips to the NCAA Tournament are tied for the second most in program history (2003-05). Kansas went to six consecutive NCAA Tournaments from 2012-17.
Under Bechard, KU currently boasts a 14-match winning streak at Horejsi Family Volleyball Arena, where the first and second rounds of this year’s NCAA Tournament will be played. That is the sixth longest active home winning streak in Division I. The 14 home victories are the most since the 2015 season when KU had 15 home wins.
The last time Bechard won this award was back in 2016. Prior to that, he won it in 2012, 2013 and 2015.
Turner finished atop the conference leaderboard with an average of 10.71 assists per set. She is the first Jayhawk to win Setter of the Year since Ainise Havili won the award three times in a row from 2015-17. Kansas’ Erin McNorton also received the honor in 2013. The Big 12 Setter of the Year has been a Kansas player in five of the 12 years the award has been presented.
Turner was selected as the Big 12 Offensive Player of the Week once during the regular season, along with being the lone Jayhawk on the Preseason All-Big 12 Team. She helped KU finish first in the league with 13.03 assists per set and 14.02 kills per set.
The junior also posted the second-best digs per set average for the Jayhawks behind primary libero Raegan Burns with her 3.02 average across all 103 sets she appeared in. Turner had the second-most service aces in the regular season with 20 total, behind fellow first-teamer Elnady, who led with 26. This is the first time in Turner’s career that she has been named First Team All-Big 12.
Elnady was a force for the Jayhawks all throughout the regular season, posting 3.57 kills per set across the 99 total sets that she appeared in. On 20 different occasions, Elnady recorded double-digit kills, including a season-high of 25 total in Kansas’ five-set victory at Iowa State. In her last time out, Elnady was just one kill shy of her season high with 24 in the Jayhawks’ four-set victory over UCF.
The junior also led the Jayhawks in aces per set with her 0.26 average, posted the second-most points per set with 4.05 and averaged the fifth most digs per set with 2.26. This is the first time in Elnady’s career that she has been named First Team All-Big 12, as her and Turner were both second-team selections last season.
Cooper was a unanimous first team selection with the standout season she had as a first-year Jayhawk, having previously played for conference-foe Texas Tech. The graduate transfer ended the regular season with a team-leading 3.76 kills per set and 4.07 points per set averages, which landed her in seventh and 10th place in the Big 12 standings, respectively. Her hitting percentage of .339 was good for eighth in the Big 12 standings as well.
The Rowlett, Texas, native was named the AVCA Division I National Player of the Week as well as the Big 12 Offensive Player of the Week just one week ago on November 21 after her massive role in Kansas’ back-to-back ranked wins over Baylor (17 kills, .516 %, 18.5 points) and BYU (season-high 25 kills, .429 %, 26.5 points). Cooper hit above .400 in 10 different matches during the regular season, and .500 or better on four separate occasions as well, with her season-high of .600 on 15 total kills coming in the Jayhawks’ four-set victory over then-No. 20 Houston. This is the first time in Cooper’s career that she has been recognized with a postseason honor by the Big 12.
Davis earned her spot on second team after an outstanding regular season, wrapping up with a .294 hitting percentage, 2.77 kills per set-average and a new-career best of 28 kills against K-State, which made her the first Jayhawk since 2009 to achieve that many kills in a single match. The junior out of Galena, Ohio, had 13 double-digit kill performances throughout the regular season.
With an average of 0.71 blocks per set, Davis posted the fourth-best number on the team, recording a total of 73 blocks during regular-season play. She recorded a season-high seven blocks against Texas Tech in the same match that she also posted a season-high number of digs with nine total. This is Davis’ first postseason Big 12 award in her career.
Burns, who was the two-time Big 12 Rookie of the Week this season, was the lone Jayhawk represented on the Big 12 All-Rookie team after her strong regular season in the libero jersey. The true freshman was the team’s primary defensive specialist, averaging the most digs per set with 3.56, which puts her at 10th in the Big 12. Burns also racked up 12 service aces and three-consecutive libero kills, all three of which happened against ranked teams (Houston, Houston, Texas).
Kansas will be hosting the first and second rounds of the NCAA Volleyball Championship at Horejsi Family Volleyball Arena this week. The Jayhawks will take on Omaha in the first round at 7 p.m. CT on Thursday. Tickets for the first and second rounds are sold out.