Juniata College's Kennedy Christy poses with the NCAA Division III women's volleyball national championship trophy Dec. 8 after she and the Eagles won their third straight title. Submitted photo

Kennedy Christy could not have imagined how her college volleyball career would turn out back in 2020.

She was a freshman then at Juniata College, fresh out of Knoch High School where she had won three straight WPIAL Class 3A championships. She didn’t play a game that first season — nobody did. Instead, as the COVID-19 pandemic raged on, all the Eagles could do was scrimmage themselves a few times during the spring.

Whether she would ever have a chance to win an NCAA Division III national championship was unclear.

“We didn’t know what COVID would have in store for us the rest of my career,” Christy said last week over the phone.

Turns out, she won three.

Christy and Juniata became three-time defending national champions Dec. 7, beating Wisconsin-Whitewater 3-2 to wrap a bow on an unbeaten 35-0 season. For Christy, now a graduate student, it was the perfect conclusion to a career that started with much uncertainty.

“There was no sad emotions. I just felt so grateful to be a part of it,” she said about her first thoughts after her final match. “Juniata volleyball is a legacy.”

Considering the stakes, Christy had her best game of the season in the national championship in Salem, Va. She recorded 18 kills with a .286 attack percentage, dug 12 balls and had two aces. Her 20.5 points were the second most she recorded this season.

In the deciding fifth set, Juniata stormed out to an 8-0 lead. Christy, who said simply she thought she “played pretty well,” recorded a kill that made it 11-5.

This title is the most special, she said, and the team’s chemistry was better than previous years.

“This was the most fun season of my career,” Christy said.

She found her parents after the game to celebrate— her dad is her “biggest support and my sounding board” — and former Juniata teammates and the men’s team also attended. Christy said she learned a family who used to babysit her had the game put on a TV while eating at Primanti Bros.

Christy, who recorded 943 kills, 72 aces, 916 digs and 80 blocks in her career, will graduate in May with a Master’s degree. She expects to move back to the Pittsburgh area. She continues to field questions about what’s next in her volleyball career, but she isn’t ready to get into coaching.

“It hasn’t even sunk in that I’m done playing,” she said.