Many new faces as Cowgirl Volleyball practice start

August 10, 2022 — The 2022 Wyoming Cowgirl volleyball team opened fall camp Tuesday with its first practices in preparation for the upcoming season. The Cowgirls will have four days with two practices each day before transitioning to once daily the rest of camp and once the fall semester starts.

UW enters year ten under head coach Chad Callihan and will feature a lot of new faces in 2022. The Cowgirls welcome eight newcomers to this year’s squad. A total of four freshmen and four transfers joined the team this season. Two of the Wyoming transfers (Macey Boggs and Kasia Partyka) transferred in for the Spring 2022 semester.

The Cowgirls return eight student-athletes from last season’s squad that went 16-14 overall and 8-10 in league play. 2019 All-Mountain West performer KC McMahon returns for her Covid-Senior season after leading UW last year with 316 kills and 358 points. Joining McMahon on the attack is Naya Shimé, who averaged a team-best 2.99 kills per set in 2021, which ranked 10th-best in the Mountain West. Shimé also finished the conference season fourth in the league averaging 3.55 kills per set last season.

Boggs and Partyka, who joined the Cowgirls in the spring, will both contend for the open setter spot for UW. Boggs spent her first two seasons at Western Nebraska CC, where she was the Region IX Setter of the Year and named to the South All-Region Team. Boggs was also an Academic All-American at Western. Partyka, meanwhile, spent 2021 at Long Beach State, where she appeared in 11 matches with eight starts while averaging nearly eight assists per set, tallying 279 for the season. Partyka also added 21 kills and 1.51 digs per set at LBSU.

Ashton Reese (Colorado Mesa) and Kendal Rivera (South Carolina State) also transferred this season. Joining the transfers are freshman newcomers Tierney Barlow (Colorado Springs, Colo.), Skylar Erickson (Caldwell, Idaho), Sarah Holcomb (Murphy, Texas), and Rylee Schulz (Carlsbad, Calif.).

The Cowgirls will play host to 15 regular season home contests, including a pair of tournaments. The Cowgirls open the season on August 26 at Wichita State. The Cowgirls open MW play on September 20 at Colorado State. Wyoming’s home-opener for league play is September 24 against UNLV.