CHICAGO (December 7, 2021) – After helping the Loyola University Chicago women's volleyball team to a Missouri Valley Conference regular season championship this season, junior Taylor Venuto (Whitmore Lake, Mich./Dexter) has been named American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) Honorable Mention All-North Region, it was announced today. The 6-foot-1 middle hitter is the first Rambler to earn AVCA All-Region accolades since 2004.
 
A 2019 and 2021 First Team All-MVC selection, Venuto earned MVC Defensive Player of the Week honors three times this season and also was named MVC Player of the Week once in a dominant campaign in which she ranked second in The Valley in both hitting percentage (.342) and blocks per set (1.21). In addition to averaging 2.47 kills per set this fall, Venuto contributed 0.48 digs and 0.16 service aces per set.
 
Venuto drilled 10 or more kills on 12 occasions this season and recorded her lone double-double by swatting a season-best 21 kills and adding 10 blocks, while hitting at a robust .636 clip (21-0-33), in a five-set victory at Evansville on October 30.
 
Earlier in the fall, she turned away 12 attacks in only three sets in the Ramblers' sweep of UIC, posting the fourth-highest, single-match blocks total in program annals.
 
Venuto's 144 blocks this season were a single-season program record, eclipsing the previous mark of 139 set by Melissa Craig in 2007, and her .342 hitting percentage (294-79-629) was the fourth-best figure in school history.
 
The first Rambler to earn AVCA All-Region recognition since Nichol Amberg and Lauren Holbrook in 2004, Venuto will enter her senior campaign needing 81 total blocks to tie Kerri Childress' school-record, career total of 419. 
 
Loyola finished the 2021 season with a 22-10 overall record it equaled a school standard by winning 14 conference matches. For the second consecutive campaign, the Ramblers reached the title match of the MVC Championship and they picked up their first regular season league title, regardless of affiliation, since 2002.