Lady Cats in action at home Saturday for senior night

by Karissa Nichols

If you weren’t in Lovell on Thursday night last week, you missed out on seeing the Lady Cats prove that they have what it takes to win games. The Varsity Lady Cats walked away with a hard fought win after sets one and two didn’t look promising with losses of 16-25 and 18-25.The third set the Lady Cats turned it around and took an early lead to gain some confidence and never let the Lovell Lady Bulldogs back into the game earning a win of 25-15. Game four looked much the same with the Lady Cats dominating the court with a win of 25-15 yet again. This took the match to game 5 where the Lady Cats showed grit and determination. They put everything together and the defensive game is what showed through as dominant for the win. The Lady Cats pushed until the end and ended up winning the set 15-13. The Lady Cats were proud of their accomplishment, as they should have been. They had just upset a higher ranked Lovell Bulldog team.

Stats for the match against Lovell include the following:

Lexi Garrison- 1 kill, 2 serve aces, 2 blocks, 2 digs

Hanna Hill- 7 kills, 1 serve ace, 16 digs

Kali Simeral- 2 serve aces, 1 block

Brooklynn Williams- 2 kills, 3 serve aces, 5 digs

Ina King- 15 kills, 1 serve ace, 3 blocks, 1 dig

Dazlynn Hunt- 1 serve ace, 10 digs

Tenzie Verhasselt- 3 kills, 1 dig

Jayssie Owsley- 9 kills, 2 serve aces, 1 block, 5 digs

Coach Shannon Hill stated the following regarding the game against Lovell, “We started out slow and made way too many of our own errors in games 1 and 2. We missed 6 serves in just game 1. Between games 2 and 3, I was so frustrated because the team I have seen all week in practice, was not the team I was seeing. We needed to take care of our own errors and control what was happening on our side of the net. We started to focus on one point at a time. A switch flipped and we beat Lovell pretty handedly in games 3 and 4. With game 5 only being to 15, we didn’t have time for errors. We were point for point with them and it was 13-13 at the end and we were in a really good rotation with Dazlynn serving and Ina in the front row, and we finished with grit, scoring two in a row. I am so proud of the girls for not giving up and finally showing everyone the team they are and doing it as a team. It was a fun match.”

The Junior Varsity team wasn’t as successful in Lovell losing in two sets with scores of 9-25 and 14-25.Coach Larry Alwin stated “six individuals took the floor on Thursday and they struggled to come together as one team. Consequently, we got steamrolled. After some in depth conversations Friday, we were able to play a great game against Powell and take them to 3 sets. The third set was a nail biter and quite exciting for our home crowd as our team clawed back from a 6-15 deficit to be tied at 20. We were point for point to 23 until Powell rattled off two huge points leaving us with a 23-25 loss. I was really proud of their play. I just wish we would start strong and stay there instead of digging a hole and being forced to dig out of it. I need to figure out how to take their shovels away to start with.”

On Friday, the dominant Powell Lady Panthers team traveled to Thermopolis for the Lady Cats to take on after coming off a hard fought win the night before. The Lady Cats couldn’t carry the confidence they gained from Thursday night into the game against Powell and ended up losing in three sets, with scores of 9-25, 17-25, 15-25.

Coach Shannon Hill said “Powell is a solid team. Our goal was to compete and take the confidence we gained from the Lovell win to carry us

into this match. We started slow again (something we are working on), but in games 2 and 3 we competed well and made them a little nervous, causing the coach to call a timeout in both games. That’s exactly what we needed to do. Prove to ourselves we can compete with the good teams. They did shut down Ina, so moving forward, we need to give her some more tools for when that happens. We learned a lot this week and gained a lot this week.” Coach Hill said “we have a big week with Worland and then Glenrock for Senior night and the girls are ready and excited to compete.”

Stats for the Powell match include the following:

Lexi- 6 digs, 1 blocks

Hanna- 7 kills, 2 serve aces, 9 digs

Brooklynn- 2 kills, 1 serve ace, 8 digs

Jayssie- 1 kill, 14 digs Ina- 2 kills, 1 dig, 1 block

Dazlynn- 1 serve ace, 11 digs

Kali- 2 kills, 2 digs, 2 blocks

The Junior Varsity Lady Cats started the match out strong against Powell with a win posting a score of 25-23. They weren’t able to finish off the match with a set 2 win and ended up losing 19-25. They scraped back in the third set but fell short with a score of 23-25.

When Freshman coach, Erike Pehringer was asked about their games for the week, she stated “The freshman lost both matches (Against Lovell and Powell) this week, but we’ve come away with a list of goals that they would like to achieve with their final two games next week. It’s been so awesome to see these girls grow, and it will be bittersweet to see their season end!”

The Lady Cats will be on the road beginning with the Freshman at Wyoming Indian on Thursday and then Worland on Friday with games at 4/5/6 pm. On Saturday fans will get a chance to watch the Lady Cats in action at home, for senior night against Glenrock. Games begin at noon with the freshman, 1 p.m. JV and at 2 p.m. Varsity will step on the floor.