Lady Bobcats take on Lady Panthers in volleyball

SUPERIOR – After a well-played match, filled with great plays by both teams the Superior Lady Bobcats came out on top when they faced off against the Alberton Lady Panthers.

Alberton was the first on the board during the first set. Superior was able to catch them and started pulling ahead. The Lady Panthers fought hard though, getting a number of great plays, and started to pull back. During one play, Alberton’s Mackenzie Spence launched a spike over the net; it was blocked by Superior, but the ball dropped almost straight down onto their side of the court for an Alberton point.

The Lady Panthers closed on Superior and were able to tie the score. However, as the set ran down both teams fought hard and the Lady Bobcats were able to pull back ahead. The set came to a close with a score of 25-22 to Superior.

The Lady Bobcats scored first in the second set and started to pull ahead; Alberton kept close, though, and tied the score. Superior started opening the gap, but the Lady Panthers were able to start pulling back again. The Lady Bobcats broke away and closed out the set with a score of 25-19.

In the third set, Superior started pulling ahead early. While the Alberton girls kept close at first, the home team was able to pull away to a strong lead. The Lady Bobcats ended the game with a final score of 25-14.

Alberton Head Coach Lexy Fisher felt the girls were getting too far into their own heads and focusing too much on when they made mistakes. In the second two games they did not play as aggressively as before.

“We kind of started hanging our heads a little bit because we got down, stopped going for every ball, stopped being aggressive, letting balls hitting the floor and missing serves,” Fisher said.

However, she felt the first game was good and recalled the girls made lots of good plays. It was common to hear her calling out ‘nice hit’ and giving lots of encouragement to the girls. She gave particular praise to eighth grader Samantha Clavenger and sophomore Montanna Baughman.

“We worked a lot on hitting the last few practices and she really took what we worked on and was able to put it into this game today,” Fisher said of Clavenger’s performance.

Baughman has also been consistent in her good performances. The coach recalled she played well in most of the positions she tried.

Superior Head Coach Beth Janney felt her team did well. She said the Lady Bobcats had been working on controlling the pace of the game and their improvement showed. The whole team played well together, especially during offensive plays.

“Our offense did a phenomenal job … hitting the ball in open spots,” Janney said.

The back row players did especially well. Morgan Sharp was commended for her work serving and setting the ball. Janney also noted Marissa Koke for her blocking at the net.

While the Lady Bobcats played well, there were a few issues. On a number of occasions the girls serving launched the ball out of bounds or into the net. The coach felt this was an area they could still improve on.

This is the last week of the regular season for the Lady Panthers. They have a game on Friday against Darby; it will be a pink game to promote breast cancer awareness. They will also celebrate senior night on Saturday with their game against Lincoln. Both will be home games.

Fisher noted they had played both teams before this season. The girls did not play well against Darby, but she hopes to see the girls bring everything together and overcome the problems they had the first time. Lincoln was a close game, which the Lady Panthers won; Fisher was excited for the game and felt her team had improved “by leaps and bounds since last time.”

During practices this week, the team has been working to be more aggressive. Fisher noted they had been letting too many balls hit the floor and were not going for the plays they should be.