Strong Serving Guides Wildcats
The Rockbridge County High School volleyball team earned a 3-0 home win over Shenandoah District rival Staunton on Thursday night in Lexington.
The 25-15, 25-18, 25-19 victory was the only match of the week for the Wildcats (5-4 overall, 3-4 district), who served well throughout the match and only trailed briefly in the second and third sets.
Making an 8-0 run in the first set, RC jumped out to a 15-4 lead and stayed comfortably ahead, ending the set with a kill from Jada Hamilton, who led all players with 10 kills and collected eight digs.
The Storm (5-6, 3-4) took a 4-1 lead in the second set, but the Wildcats battled back, and the set was tight until RC went on a 4-0 run to go up 18-11. Staunton would cut the lead to three, but the Wildcats ended the set on a 4-0 run, winning three points on Cesi Beidle’s serve.
In the third set, Staunton led 3-1, but the Wildcats responded with a 7-1 run to take an 8-4 lead. The Storm would trim it to 12-11, but Beidle served up two of her match-high 11 aces to help RC go up 19-13. RC head coach Gabe Wagner said Beidle “has been pretty awesome for us, working from the service line.”
Staunton kept battling in the third set and capitalized on several RC errors, cutting the lead to 22-19, but RC won the next three points to seal the win, with a kill from Emmy Duff, an ace from Maisen Mckemy, and a kill from Hamilton.
Relieved his team was able to finish the match in straight sets, Wagner said, “I thought towards the end of set three, we started to err and erred more than we should, but we kept service pressure on, which has been our big strength.
“We played our game,” added Wagner. “We played strong. We can always clean stuff up, though.”
Wagner gave credit to the Storm for not going away quietly. “They fought till the very last point,” he said.
Other than Hamilton and Beidle, who notched eight kills, RC’s leaders were Mckemy with 23 assists, three blocks, three digs and three aces; Hayley Higgins with 14 digs, and Mackenzie Mc-Cormick with four kills, three blocks and two digs.
Brittany Davenport led the Storm with five kills, while Kaylan Herron dished out 18 assists, and Brook-Lyn Kittrell had four kills and a block.
The Wildcats were scheduled to start this week with two road matches, at
, Turner Ashby on Monday and at Buffalo Gap last night. On Thursday, they’ll play host to district rival Wilson Memorial, starting with junior varsity action at 6 p.m. They’ll have a rematch at home against nondistrict rival TA on Monday, beginning with the JV match at 5:30 p.m., before playing host to district rival Riverheads on Tuesday, starting with JV action at 6 p.m.
