Kim Yeon-koung helps Pink Spiders dominate first two games

We're nine days into the V League season and the Heungkuk Life Pink Spiders are already starting to pull away from the pack, winning their first two matches in three straight sets.

Kim Yeon-koung of the Incheon Pink Spiders celebrate after scoring against Gwangju Pepper Savings Bank AI Peppers on Tuesday at Incheon Samsan World Gymnasium in Incheon. [YONHAP]

We're nine days into the V League season and the Heungkuk Life Pink Spiders are already starting to pull away from the pack, winning their first two matches in three straight sets.

The Pink Spiders are the only team who have not dropped a single set since the start of the season. While GS Caltex have also won their first two matches, they conceded one set against the Gwangju Pepper Savings Bank AI Peppers on Friday.

Spearheading the Pink Spiders’ success is star player Kim Yeon-koung. Kim scored a total of 18 points in the club’s first match against the AI Peppers, the most of the match, with an attack success rate of 71.43 percent. She went on to score 14 points in the Pink Spiders’ second match against Korea Ginseng Corporation, marking an attack success rate of 54.55 percent.

Kim signed a one-year, 700-million-won ($540,000) deal in June to rejoin the Pink Spiders in the V league.

The last time Kim played for the Pink Spiders was in the 2020-21 season, when she returned for one season after 11 years playing in Japan, China and Turkey.

Kim debuted in 2005 with the Incheon club and moved overseas for the first time in 2009, joining a Japanese club.

Kim then jetted off to Shanghai in May of 2021 to join the Shanghai Bright Ubest Women's Volleyball Club, returning to the team four years after she led it to the top of the Chinese Super League in the 2017-18 season to snap a 17-year drought. The team finished runner-up in the championship that year.

At the time, the Pink Spiders, who Kim has remained contractually bound to if she plays in Korea, made it clear that an offer was always on the table, rebuffing the suggestion of a trade to the Pepper Savings Bank at the start of the season.

After having spent a restless 2020-21 season, playing a total of 41 games including the KOVO Cup, all regular season games and the championship playoffs, one of the main reasons Kim chose the Shanghai club seemed to be because of the shorter season.

This January, Kim became a free agent internationally after rounding off the Chinese Volleyball Super League season with Shanghai, finishing in third place.

Kim headed to the United States at the end of the season. At the time it looked unlikely that she would return to KOVO. After Kim returned home from training in the United States, the Heungkuk Life Pink Spiders reportedly reached out to Kim to sign a deal.

The Pink Spiders will next face the Kixx on Tuesday.

BY YUN SO-HYANG [yun.sohyang@joongang.co.kr]