College Achievers: Warren graduate Ziegler off to a hot start for Illinois State volleyball
Warren Township High School graduate Ruth Ziegler, a junior opposite hitter on the Illinois State University women’s volleyball team, is proving prognosticators correct.
In August the 6-foot-3 junior earned Missouri Valley Conference coaches’ selection to the MVC preseason all-conference team. As a sophomore Ziegler started 13 of 30 matches with 219 kills and 53 blocks. She made the MVC All-Tournament Team.
A week after earning the preseason nod, Ziegler was named MVC player of the week for her work at the Seton Hall Tournament, where she was named to the all-tournament team.
Through the first three matches she registered a team-high 28 kills on a .389 attack percentage, adding four blocks, three digs and three service aces.
A few days later, in a three-game sweep of Central Michigan, Ziegler landed eight aces, tied for the second-most in a match in Illinois State program history.
In the second set, Ziegler’s kill tied the score 21-21, then she reeled off three straight ace serves.
Ziegler, whose teammates include senior libero Peyton Turner (Benet Academy) and freshman middle blocker Sidney Wright (St. Charles North), was leading the Redbirds in kills, blocks and aces through six matches. Her .355 attack percentage was more than 100 percentage points higher than her sophomore season.
With a bang
After making his first college start in a 33-7 win over Jacksonville State, North Dakota State quarterback Nathan Hayes (St. Charles East) earned Mountain West offensive player of the week honors.
The fifth-year player — he’s been with the Bison throughout — completed 14 of 22 passes for 160 yards and two touchdowns. On his first possession Hayes went four of four passing with a six-yard touchdown pass. He added a 44-yard touchdown pass near the end of the first half.
Oldie but a goodie
This happened a month after College Achievers closed shop for the summer: Collin Kao (Lakes), formerly a graduate student for the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, was named the NCAA’s Division III men’s indoor track and field scholar athlete of the year.
A former Purdue Boilermaker, Kao maintained a 4.00 grade-point average while winning Division III indoor pole vault at a personal-best 5.33 meters, or 17 feet, 5¾ inches. That was part of a 13-meet stretch, indoors and out, in which Kao won the event 11 times and placed second twice.
At the 2026 Division III outdoor meet in May, Kao placed third at 5.10 meters, or 16-8¾.
Rewarded
Following its historic 2026 baseball season, Northern Illinois University coach Ryan Copeland (Elk Grove) earned a contract extension good through the 2032 season.
Last spring the Huskies set a program record with 36 victories. Copeland led them to their first Mid-American Conference title, and their first NCAA regional since 1972. NIU’s 12-10 win over Coastal Carolina was its first NCAA tourney victory in program history.
Under his tenure, the Huskies have set nine single-game or single-season records, and his 78 victories over three seasons are the best in DeKalb since 2009-11. Copeland also coached NIU’s first first-team all-conference pick since 2016 in pitcher Max Vaisvila (Willowbrook), now with a New York Yankees’ affiliate in the Florida Coast League.
Leadership
Another NIU connection, former Huskies soccer player Kelsey Passaglia (Cary-Grove) — now in her fourth year as associate athletic director and senior women’s administrator at the University of St. Francis in Indiana — was the inaugural recipient of the Crossroads League’s Senior Women’s Leader of the Year award.
Crossroads League athletic directors voted on the award. It highlighted Passaglia for, among other things, becoming St. Francis’ first senior women’s leader and starting Indiana’s first collegiate women’s flag football team.
doberhelman@dailyherald.com