RAPID CITY, S.D. --- Senior Jacey Koethe came to the South Dakota Mines volleyball team as an inconsistent, hard-swinging middle that eventually let her play on the court do most of her talking.

Koethe progressed to the program's initial First-Team All-Rocky Mountain Conference performer. She'll also leave second on the program's all-time kills list.
 
"I think I definitely came a long way from freshman year," she said recently, a month after concluding her career with the Hardrockers in the RMAC postseason tournament. 
 
"You can see it in my stats, it was very inconsistent, kind of all over the place, up and down. Just through the years I've experienced a lot of growth after a lot of talks with Coach (Lauren Torvi Prochazka), being more consistent in my game and not bombing balls out of bounds when the set is not there, just doing things that are not smart. I think I grew a lot over the last four years to be able to do that, to get my numbers so high, and I think my teammates saw that in me as well. It was pretty cool to be able to do something like that."
 
Torvi Prochazka said that Koethe, a 6-foot-1 middle, showed growth and development. It was all about consistency for her.
 
"We had so many conversations in my office, like 'Jacey, you can't hit .300 or .500 one day and negative the next," she said. "You have to find a way to make the decisions all the time and just be consistently good and you have to find a way to not be so frustrated. For her it was being such a young athlete. She didn't want to let her teammates down. You just have to let it go and play for the next point."
 
Koethe, who was also a second-team All-RMAC player her sophomore season and honorable mention in 2021, finished her career with 906 kills, only behind Mines' all-time leader Justine Blade's 1,111 kills.


 
She also finished third in career hitting percentage (.254) and eighth in career total attacks (2,306), as well as fifth in season kills (346 in 2022), fifth in season hitting percentage (.301 in 2022), and ninth in season total attacks (838 in 2022). 
 
Koethe averaged 2.55 kills per set for her career, including 3.43 in 2022, which is just behind Blade's 3.46 in 2012.
In the RMAC this season, Koethe led the way in total points per set at 4.41, just ahead of MSU Denver's Rylee Hladky, the RMAC Player of the Year. She was also fifth in kills, sixth in total blocks (97), and eighth in hitting percentage.
 
Torvi Prochazka said that 2022 was a fun season because it was a season that was supposed to be for Koethe.
 
"She was supposed to be on top of her game and she was supposed to be one of the top players in the conference, and she was," she said. "She led all year long in points per set, which is not an easy thing for a middle. You are going to see outsides No. 1 in points. There are more opportunities for points because you set the outsides more than middles. For a middle to be No. 1 or 2, that is incredible. It shows you what she was giving, not only in volleyball but for her team.
 
"We developed her hard, she worked hard. I tell all of the freshmen now that Jayce didn't come in her freshman year looking like this. She put in the work to get here and you have to understand that too – it doesn't just come to you, you have to work for it."
 
A quiet freshman recruit
Koethe, from West Des Moines, Iowa, was in Torvi Prochazka's first recruiting class as she began the program's rebuild. The Mines head coach called Koethe "very non-communicative," as they were having a tough time getting in contact with her.


 
"We really liked Jacey, but she had never gotten back to us. My assistant at the time then reached out to her again and she happened to respond," Torvi Prochazka said. "When she came to visit with her mom, you could tell that her mom wanted her to be in the visit more then maybe she wanted to. I think she said about four words on her visit, just because she was so shy. We thought there was no way because she was also being recruited by a couple of NSIC (Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference) schools." 
She committed shortly after that.
 
Koethe called her freshman campaign an overwhelming year. She played in 109 sets in her first season, adding 194 kills, but hit just .184.
 
"I had such a big class, the program culture was changing, becoming more established and obviously school here is not easy either, so it took a lot of work just within the team and within school to get it done," she said.
 
She showed marked improvement at 2.76 kills per set her sophomore year, hitting .238 and 214 kills as a junior, hitting .258 with 2.38 kills per set.
 
"I didn't really have any expectations for myself right away, just to really come in and do what I can and compete hard and maybe get a starting spot," she said. "I think balancing that with school was a little bit challenging at first – I didn't get a lot of sleep because of it, but that's OK. I just had such a great time with all my friends. The people that I came in with are still my best friends and will still be my best friends after I graduate."
 
Her volleyball beginnings and her career future
Koethe didn't begin playing volleyball until eighth grade as she was more of a "basketball girl." Eventually, by the time she was a sophomore or junior in high school, she said things changed and she realized volleyball was the sport she would pursue.
 
"I decided, 'nope, the culture of volleyball is what I like, the team atmosphere, and it wasn't a contact sport,'" she said.
 
Although she continued to play basketball, she closed her high school volleyball career as an All-Conference, All-District, and honorable mention All-State player.
 
"I felt like I loved volleyball more. I think that's why I put more time and effort into it," she said. "I felt I was better at the sport. It (basketball) just went into the back burner where volleyball was before."
In junior high, she said she also began to realize she enjoyed taking care of others. Koethe is majoring in pre-professional health science and she wants to get into pediatrics.
 
"I was always like the motherly friend that wanted to take care of people when they were sick," she said. "When they needed help, I wanted to help. That was kind of what got me interested in medicine. In general, it's just helping people out. I think I decided that in about the eighth grade and stuck with it ever since."
 
Koethe recently changed her mind a little on a career path as she was going to go into medical school. Now she plans on attending physician's assistant (PA) school after graduation. She said she decided she wanted to have a little better work-life balance.
 
"I don't really care that much if I'm the one that was in charge at the top. I just want to be part of it, be part of that team atmosphere," she said. "I do have a year of eligibility left, but it's time to pursue my career, I guess. It's bittersweet, but I have some big things ahead. I'll miss (volleyball). I made such good memories and such good friends here and it went by so fast because I had a really good time.
"I got to know all of my best friends and play with them, traveling all over Colorado and Wyoming. I've never really been to Colorado as much as I have since being here, or Utah. It is cool to experience and see new places. It was a good experience."
 
Hardrockers will be young, but optimistic in 2023
Torvi Prochazka knows she will have some work to do coming off this RMAC Tournament team, losing seven seniors, including Koethe. The 'Rockers were 8-10 in league play (11-16 overall) and finished seventh, facing RMAC No. 2 and nationally No. 14 Regis in the first round of the tournament.

The Rangers prevailed in four sets (25-20, 25-27, 25-22, 25-17), but Torvi Prochazka said there was not an ounce of disappointment in her because she said she walked away from that match proud because every single one of them played as hard as they could.


 
"Even though it was a loss, it was a great opportunity; it was a great way to show their young teammates what is ahead," she said.
 
Torvi Prochazka said qualifying for the RMAC Tournament for just the second time in school history was a good experience, just for the fact that they had one more week with the seven seniors.
 
"We played a nationally-ranked team and honestly I thought we played well. We ended up finishing the match with a higher hitting percentage than them, which was a huge accomplishment," she said. "There were parts of our game that broke down, but I thought we played really competitive against Regis."
The Hardrockers return rising senior setter Kiley Metzger (honorable mention All-RMAC), junior Emma Grimm, and seven sophomores, including Paisley Gibson, who was also honorable mention All-RMAC. Six of those freshmen saw some court action in 2022.
 
"We're going to be very young for a while because we have nine returners, but only two upperclassmen," Torvi Prochazka said. "We'll have a very large freshman class with hopefully two transfers in it. We'll have a little more balance, but still a large freshman and sophomore class. We have established what our culture is like, but definitely, you have to adapt to what the culture is every year with your personnel.
 
"There will be a lot of growth but that is what we do, develop them as people first and then athletes. We'll rein everyone in quickly. I think our future is bright. I think they (seniors) have laid the foundation well for us and every year is another step up."
 
About South Dakota Mines
The South Dakota School of Mines & Technology is a member of the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference (RMAC) and NCAA Division II offering 10 men's and women's varsity intercollegiate athletic programs. The Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference is a premier NCAA Division II conference with 15 members, as well as four associate members, located in the states of California, Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Utah.