Spartans drop three straight to the Wildcats

Tuesday at home, the Exira-EHK varsity volleyball team welcomed the Glidden-Ralston Wildcats to town but it did not go their way, as they dropped three straight matches, losing the final set by 11 points.

In set one, the Wildcats were dominating, early and eventually winning, 25-10. The Spartans came back stronger in game two, only dropping the set 25-22.

“We made a couple of strategical adjustments in regards to our rotation and also how we would play their hitters,” said Head Coach Derek Reischauer. “I'm not sure if those helped more than just a mental reset after the first match. We have a tendency to not start out very strong and I'm just not sure why. We definitely play our better volleyball as the day or match goes along. We had some nice serving in the second set that was effective for us that kept us in the match.”

Senior Makenzie Riley leads the Spartans in multiple categories, including 32 blocks and 150 assists this season. Reischauer commented on Riley’s gameplay over Glidden-Ralston.

“Makenzie played pretty well up front for us,” he said. “Glidden-Ralston is very strong up the middle and most teams struggle with them up front. We were wanting to get outside on Glidden-Ralston, so we weren't necessarily setting our middles as much as we have in other matches.”

Other players also stepped up for the Spartans and performed strong, including Seniors Quinn Grubbs and Shay Burmeister. Grubbs had nine assists and one block, while Burmeister had nine digs and 2.3 kills, but it wasn’t enough as the Wildcats cruised to victory.

“Glidden-Ralston is a tough team with some good athletes that can jump, especially up the middle,” Reischauer added.

The Spartans needed to put that one behind them as they take on the West Harrison Hawkeyes, 2-16, at their place Thursday. They will have to do it short handed as two players are no longer on the roster for the remainder of the season, Juniors Gemini Goodwin and Hannah Nelson.

“We have struggled all year with unforced errors and beating ourselves on too many occasions,” Reischauer said. “We need to clean up the unforced errors in our passing game that leads to too many pushes and free balls. We were coming off a pretty good setting/hitting weekend, but then struggled a little bit with that on Tuesday, so we will get some time in on that.”

 
 

 

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