A year after winning a sectional title in 2023, Greencastle’s volleyball team had high expectations of going a step further in 2024.
Instead, a small late season wobble saw an experienced Tiger Cub team finish third in the WIC after being swept by Indian Creek and fail to win a set in its sectional title defense against Parke Heritage.
For a roster full of underclassmen, the loss stung but in the long run, might have been the catalyst needed for Greencastle to embark on an epic 2025 campaign.
The Tiger Cubs finished 30-5, sweeping the Monon Athletic Conference title with a 7-0 mark, claiming the Putnam County Volleyball Tournament after letting it slip the prior year, and winning not only a sectional title, but the school’s first volleyball regional title since 1998.
Seven seniors led the squad in various capacities, including 2024 Putnam County Volleyball Player of the Year Makenzie Creviston, Keely and Roan Amis and Haley Owens along the front line, Meilani York and Ellie Knuth in the back row. Sophomore back row Janae Greenlee and freshman all-rounder Sophia Gooch made a critical impact all over the floor.
With so many potent attackers up front and defenders sweeping up behind, Allie Landry was given the task of pulling the strings to make everything work.
Landry had been the Tiger Cubs’ sole setter as a sophomore in 2023 but split duties as a junior with Kaitlin Welker in 2024.
Back in charge of the operation in 2025, Landry orchestrated an offense with four hitters that claimed over 100 kills and a fifth on 94 kills, the senior setter adding 88 kills of her own while recording 949 assists, 236 digs, 108 aces and 37 blocks.
Landry’s mastery of the offense and decision-making on the floor led her to be named the Putnam County Volleyball Player of the Year for the 2025 season.
The disappointment of the finish to her junior season was a rallying cry for the seniors heading into the 2025 season.
“In the first round of sectionals, we got smoked last year,” Landry said. “That was not what we were expecting. We had way more goals than that.
“Coming off that season, all of us, especially having so many seniors, we wanted to come out stronger this year, knowing we were going to get everyone back, it made it easier for us to get together in the offseason and set goals for ourselves that we could attain as we were very excited for the upcoming season.
“It was really nice having Makenzie and Keely as they are super driven and both of them had the highest amount of kills on the team coming into this year,” Landry added. “Getting to play with them for so long and knowing we had one season left, it really motivated us to do all we could in the offseason and make the most out of the time we had left.
“We wanted to make our last season our best season.”
Landry’s athletic prowess is not limited to volleyball, having qualified for the IHSAA Girls’ Tennis Individual Regional for a second time in three years, as well as helping Greencastle win a fifth-straight sectional title.
A focus on tennis led to Landry relinquishing club volleyball, initially seen as ideal in her pursuit of the sport, but the draw of volleyball was strong enough to cause her to reconsider her plans before her senior year began.
“I wasn’t going to play club volleyball last year, having decided to focus on tennis,” Landry said. “I had played from fourth grade all the way until freshman year, stopped as a sophomore and had planned not to play again until I randomly got offered a spot on another club team as they needed another setter.
“That really helped. I really didn’t want to take another year off as I missed playing when I did. That spot felt like a sign that I needed to keep playing volleyball.
“Initially, I thought I was just going to be playing tennis in college and felt it was a waste of time if I did play volleyball,” Landry added. “I used the offseason to get really good at tennis and was going to do the same, having thrown all my club stuff out, but I ran back to get it and have since committed to playing both tennis and volleyball at DePauw.”
The club, Rev Volleyball Academy, came about thanks to a local connection to Greencastle in Suzanne Masten, offering a chance to get more time on the court as well as different perspective by working with a new set of teammates.
“This was an entirely new team,” Landry noted. “I had played for (Crossroads of America) in previous years, so I went in knowing only coach Masten, who got me on the team.
“It was so different playing on a team with nobody that I knew as I had only played with my same group of friends and a few others. It was a really great experience as it helped me connect with new hitters and learn from them.
“Going back and forth between two different sets of hitters, especially different middles as everyone has different timings that they like, was hard,” Landry added. “It was easier to shift from club to my school teammates than the other way because of muscle memory but it was definitely helpful to have the extra training.”
On top of getting back into club ball, Landry said the Tiger Cubs opted for a different plan in the summer, going for more time on the court as a team rather than individual work.
“We did something different by going to the Dunes Camp,” Landry said. “Usually, we go to a college like Ball State or Indiana University.
“Instead of focusing on drilling, we wanted to get a lot of playing experience, feel out a bunch of different lineups and throw people into different spots. We played 10 games over two days and were so tired after that.
“We stayed in a house together and all the togetherness was so fun,” Landry added.
The time at the camp was also a chance to work in Greenlee and Gooch into the fold, forming the bases of the team that would explode into life in a few months’ time.
“The Dunes Camp was the first time we had all played together as a group,” Landry noted. “We played with Janae the previous year, though she had a smaller role on the varsity last year but she was a great personality and was a great addition to the team this summer.
“We’ve known about Sophia for a few years so we were so excited to have her join. People asked if she would take away some of the spotlight from players in our senior year but we wanted her and all of the success that comes with having her on the team. We absolutely love her.”
Once the 2025 season arrived, Landry said the team was dialed in far more than the previous year, going in with the mindset of not leaving anything on the table every night on the court.
“Losing county and sectionals really lit a fire under us for this year,” Landry said. “We knew with the talent and the experience we had, we told ourselves we were going to county and not losing a set. We were going to sectionals and not losing a set.
“We had a don’t let up mindset against any team we faced. We didn’t want there to be any teams where we thought we could have played better against or we shouldn’t have lost to them.
“Every single game we played, we played with the intention of not losing any sets we didn’t need to,” Landry added. “We tried to fight in every match, even in losses like to Northview.
“We only lost two matches in which we didn’t win a set, which was different from past years where we’d gotten swept 3-0.”
Landry also set high goals for herself, wanting to better one of her own records and reach another major milestone as a setter.
“For settlers, reaching 1,000 assists is a big goal and one I had reached the previous year,” Landry said. “This year, my biggest personal goal was to reach 2,000 assists. That’s a huge goal.
“I also wanted to beat my ace record from sophomore year, which I didn’t quite get, but I was fifth in the state in aces. As a competitive person, I was tracking that leaderboard all season.”
A season-opening loss to Danville was followed up by a 13-match winning streak, cementing the start the team was looking for as well as showcasing the level of play the team had at its disposal.
“Our longest streak before this season was freshman year,” Landry said. “We started out 0-7 then won our next seven games. That was the longest streak I could think of.
“That stretch of the season was so fun. It’s very easy to let up in the middle of the season but I’m not sure we lost more than a set or two in that stretch.
“It was a case where we put our heads down, did the work and looked up to realize we were 13-0 over the past couple of weeks,” Landry added. “It was so fun to do that with my best friends.”
During the run, Greencastle won six of its seven Monon Athletic Conference games, all-but wrapping up the conference title a week into September, though Landry said the team almost didn’t notice their success at the time.
“We had talked about it last year when we played teams that were going to be in the new conference,” Landry said about winning the new conference. “Again, we put our heads down, put in the work, beat the teams we needed to beat and looked up to see we had won the conference.
“We hadn’t won conference before and it was exciting to be the first team to win the new conference title.”
The streak was broken when Greencastle hosted Northview, the only five-set match played by the Tiger Cubs on the season.
“Even though we lost to Northview, it was my favorite match of the year,” Landry said. “Just the name Northview, even if they’re in the middle of nowhere, they’ve been good at everything; there’s always some underlying tension thanks to club ball but they have smoked us year in and year out.
“This year, we thought if there was a year to beat them, this was it, so we went into that game so excited. It was a five-set match and so long and while we were sad afterward, we all realized how well we played and said we should be proud of ourselves, not sad. It was a fun game.”
The Tiger Cubs dusted themselves off, winning 10-straight matches to end the regular season and heading into postseason play with momentum at its back, though Landry said the team was reminded not to assume anything once sectional play began.
“We tried to have the mindset of not being too comfortable entering the postseason,” Landry said. “Everyone’s record is 0-0 at that point, something our coaches said to us a lot.
“In past years, we’ve had good seasons and gotten to the postseason thinking, it’s Parke Heritage, we’ve never played them before but thought we had it. They came out swinging and we weren’t ready for it at all.
“This year, we didn’t care about stats, records or if we played anyone in the sectional already, we wanted to clean it off as no one wants to be done and everyone is going to play as hard as they can,” Landry added. “We did our best to take care of business.”
Against the same Parke Heritage team that knocked them out of the tournament the year prior, Greencastle swept the Wolves to advance, eventually sweeping South Putnam and South Vermillion for a second sectional title in three years.
“We wanted to build on what we did sophomore year,” Landry said. “We won the sectional but we weren’t ready for the regional then.
“We wanted to give ourselves the opportunity to prove ourselves, that we weren’t just a team that won a sectional but could go beyond that. We were locked in during sectional week and the week after that getting ready for the regional.”
While sweeping through the sectional, Landry said the team was constantly being pushed in practice as head coach Denise Meyer put the squad through intense practices, utilizing Maggie York and Sarah Sprangler, former Marian University players and current Tiger Cub assistant coaches opposite the starting lineup.
“It really helps having a really good coaching staff like we had,” Landry pointed out. “They’re all so focused and wanted our success sometimes more than we did, so they were willing to do whatever it took and called whoever they needed to call to help us.
“They watched so many games of film and scouted teams. We spent so much time watching Covenant Christian and Barr-Reeve matches. The focus leading up to sectionals, the regional and semi-state, doing frustrating drills and other things that would get our minds working was with the goal of making things mentally easier during the match than during practices.”
Going into the match against Covenant Christian in the regional, Landry admitted nerves were getting to the team beforehand but a 9-1 start in the opening set eventually led to a sweep of the Warriors.
“We were really nervous, especially with how the regional went sophomore year,” Landry said. “We said we were not letting that happen again. That could not be us.
“We knew it could be our last game and said we had to leave it all out there. Even though we had scouted them all week, we also knew they were going out to avoid playing their last game, too, so we had to go out expecting everything.
“It was so fun,” Landry added. “The start set the tone for the rest of the match as we were so hyped to be there and showed we came ready to play.”
The win saw Greencastle paired with 2A No. 1 Barr-Reeve in the opening round of the Bedford Semi-State and though the season would come to an end against the Vikings, Landry said the squad battled gamely and enjoyed the experience.
“Even though we lost 3-0, the scores were a little closer than they showed,” Landry said. “We played really hard with (Barr-Reeve) most of the time.
“It came down to a couple of errors here and there that we could have cleaned up that really would have made a difference. The opening set was 22-22 and if we had won that, it really would have made a difference.
“Going in, they were the favorite and we were the underdogs, but the thought was, why can’t it be us to beat them?” Landry added. “Even though it was likely going to be our last game, we were so excited to play and had so much energy going into it.”
Just a few weeks later, Landry and Creviston would find themselves sharing the same court as several of the newly-crowned state champions as part of the Indiana High School Volleyball Coaches Association All-Star Games.
“Makenzie and I both initially didn’t want to see them but it was so hard to be like that because they were so nice,” Landry said. “We told them we were rooting for them because if you lose to someone, it might as well be the state champions.
“Even if we were a little salty about losing to them, they were super sweet, so it was easy to cheer for them to win state and play with them at the All-Star game.”
Greencastle finished the 2025 season with a 30-5 record, a 7-0 mark in MAC play, the school’s 21st volleyball sectional title and fifth regional title.
“I could not have asked for a better way to end my senior season,” Landry said. “It could not have been any better or any more fun.
“I have no regrets from this season, no games where I felt like we should have won or played better. We played to our full potential, even nearly winning a couple of games 25-0.
“The dominance we had was so fun,” Landry added. “That came from all the work we put in together since we’ve been in fourth grade, driving to club practices, seeing all of that time and effort pay off.”
Landry credited getting back into the swing of club ball for helping her have a fitting final season for Greencastle and for performing as well as she did over the course of the campaign.
“I’m really glad that I joined the club team because last year, I felt I was rusty going into the season and I didn’t want that at all,” Landry said. “I was able to hit the ground running and work toward my 2,000-assist goal as well as all my team-oriented goals with my friends.”
Also helping was a change in system that featured Landry as the sole setter in the rotation, a formation Landry was happy to take back up after splitting setting duties a season ago.
“Being the competitive person that I am, I wanted to run a 5-1 system like we had run my sophomore season,” Landry said. “Switching from that system into a 6-2 system as a junior was kind of hard for me but I loved playing with Kaitlin and I do like hitting, so I was happy to get an extra season of swinging in.
“I was definitely very happy to get my 5-1 permission back. Even if we ran that system last year, I don’t think all of us had the same fire or urgency of last year playing together. It might not have changed as much as we think because we had a very different mindset going into this season.”
Though there’s more volleyball to come for Landry, doing it without the teammates she has had the past four seasons was going to be tough, though she added she hoped the returning players picked up the mantle and carried the program forward.
“I’m so grateful to have been a part of a program and the friendships I’ve gained from playing with these girls my whole life,” Landry said. “I would not have traded it for anything else.
“Rowan coming in, Greta (Szabo) coming in, it’s so welcoming and such a fun program to be a part of. I’m so sad to have to leave and a little jealous of all the underclassmen that have years left to play for Denise.
“The records I set are one thing but the culture that myself and the other seniors have created is important,” Landry added. “I hope our leadership and the bond we created with one another is something that others are inspired to carry on.”
