Heat take second at tournament
Nick Ianniello/Mineral Independent Hot Springs’ Randi Arnold jumps up for the ball at the Mineral county Shootout Saturday. Hot Springs made it to the championship game, but lost to Arlee.
The Hot Springs Lady Savage Heat competed at the Mineral County Shootout last Saturday, and although they made it to the championship match, they lost in two games in what Head Coach Bonnie Franklin called “petering out.”
“It was a very long day for them,” she said. “But it was that way for everyone.”
The Lady Savage Heat began with pool play in the morning at 8:30 a.m. and ended with the championship game at 8 p.m. making it 12 hours of off and on volleyball play.
“Unfortunately our girls struggled the entire day,” Franklin said. “Everyone on the team took their turn at not doing so well.”
All though it makes for a very long day, Franklin said that it is a really good experience for the team. “That’s the beauty of these tournaments, you get a lot of playing time,” she said. “Our team just ran out of steam and couldn’t pull it together.”
The Lady Savage Heat lost to the Arlee Scarlets in the championship match 25-19, 25-9. At the Shootout, there was pool play from 8:30 a.m. until 4 p.m. to determine the four teams that would make it to the semi-finals. Those teams would play a best out of three series, with the first two games to 25 and the third game, if necessary, to 15.
Franklin cited poor serving as one of the main reasons the Lady Savage Heat weren’t quite on their game.
“Our serving was extremely poor all day long,” she said. “At one point against Arlee they had six points and five of those were from our missed serves. You can’t win games if you don’t have your serves down.”
However, even though the team as a whole was weak in the serving department, Franklin said that her sub, Rachel Ambo, played extremely well against Charlo.
“She had eight consecutive points off her serve,” she said. “I am very proud of her.”
For the upcoming week Franklin said that they’re going to be really working on their serves.
“That was our weakest spot,” she said. “We’re going to be serving, serving, serving all week.”
The Lady Savage Heat travel to Noxon on Friday and then have their first home match of the season against Charlo on Saturday.
“We’re really looking forward to finally having a home match,” Franklin said.