The first road trip for the Eastern volleyball team is also one of its longest, as the Panthers made the approximately 420-mile trip to Mt. Pleasant, Mich., Thursday for the Central Michigan Chippewa Invitational.

The only spot on the schedule that is further away is Youngstown, Ohio, where the Panthers will play Sept. 20 and 21.

The Panthers will play Central Michigan and Illinois-Chicago Friday at 11:30 a.m. and 4 p.m. and North Dakota State Saturday at noon.

Eastern head coach Julie Allen said leaving early Thursday gives the team more time to prepare before playing three matches in the invitational.

“We want to make sure that we can get into town at a reasonable hour since we’re getting into the eastern (time zone),” Allen said.

She also said the team will likely head to the gym once they arrive in order to stretch out after the long drive.

The Panthers had a number of practices since they started the season 0-3 last weekend in the EIU Panther Invitational. Allen said she liked the team’s competitive play in those matches, but they still had plenty do over the past week.

“We’ve currently been working on terminating the last ball we possibly can,” she said. “We’re really working on being more aggressive at the end, and you’ll see that a lot with our outside hitters as well as our middles and right sides. They’ll be more aggressive at the net. Not only blocking, but just attacking.”

Speaking of blocking, the Panthers have the fourth-most blocks in the OVC so far. In fact, Eastern is in the top five in six of the seven statistical categories listed on the OVC website.

It is still very early in the season, and Allen said she has not paid a lot of attention to the statistics of the rest of the conference yet.

“It’s not something I really look into, comparing us to the OVC,” she said. “I’m really just comparing us to us right now and trying to get our numbers better. I know what numbers we need to get to in order to succeed, and we’re right there. We’re knocking on the door.”

Allen said the goal is to ideally reach 16 kills per set. If they don’t reach that number, the scoring must come from other avenues. The Panthers are currently fifth in the conference with 12.27 blocks per set.

Of course, the statistics in any sport can be volatile early in the season.

Another key factor for the Panthers is the development of sophomore setter Bailey Chandler, who played 107 sets last season and has played in all 11 sets so far this year.

Senior Breanna Jager has appeared in one set as a setter. The team’s third setter, freshman Kristen Jankowski, has not played yet this season.

Allen, who was a setter four years at the University of Portland and has the eighth-most assists in school history, has been working closely with the setters both in practice and during the games.

During the games, Allen said she focuses on game strategy with the setters, asking what they see on the court compared to what she saw, including the locations of their teammates as they go up for potential kills and where opposing blockers are positioned.

“We’re really trying to get our setters to get a better gauge on what’s going on in the play,” Allen said. “They are very smart students of the game. They listen to everything and try to apply it, so it’s been really fun.”

Chandler is currently third in the conference with 10.09 assists per set and has 111 total assists.

Adam Tumino can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected]