ADNA — Starting off quick, and taking advantage of a hefty dose of Napavine errors, the Adna volleyball team swept the Tigers in straight sets Thursday night at home, 25-13, 28-26, 25-18.
Fresh off a tough loss on the road to Toutle Lake, the Pirates put on the pressure immediately and responded in force, putting the Tigers in compromising positions with an unrelenting attack and service game.
The Tigers, for their part, didn’t help themselves out too much, either, committing 16 unforced errors in the first set and 35 for the game.
The goal was to serve and hit aggressively,” Pirates coach Wendie Dotson said. “It’s a tough week to begin with, It could've gone either way, I didn’t know how they would respond … We were disappointed in ourselves after that loss and they had something to prove.”
Kendall Humphrey and Danika Hallom were aggressive at the net taking advantage of Tiger mistakes, with Humphrey putting up 11 kills, 10 digs, and four aces and Hallom adding 12 kills and nine digs.
Brooklyn Loose added five aces and 14 assists, racking up a huge scoring run as a server in the first set that helped the Pirates to a 16-3 lead early. Gaby Guard added 10 assists and six kills, and Parker Feist had nine digs and a kill.
After what could have been a destabilizing loss to a rising Toutle team, the Pirates responded with a big rivalry win, and their second sweep of Napavine this season.
“It’s nice to see them all playing together,” Dotson said. “They all have a part, they all do their part, and they play it well. It’s good to see how they’re growing. This is one of those games you could see and feel it, they wanted to win it so bad. Napavine wanted it as well, they’re tough to play against, it's always nice to be able to win against them.”
On the other side, after a miserable first set, Napavine settled down a bit in the second and third, but shot themselves in the foot way too often to stay competitive.
Jessie McCoy, Morgan Hamilton, and Emily Kang all served 100%, and McCoy added 12 digs, but the Tigers finished with 14 third ball errors and seven second ball errors on the night and were out of system for most of the match.
“That’s pretty much the game,” Tigers coach Monica Dailey said of the errors. “It makes a difference, it makes a huge difference. We did not play our game one time, we were chasing the ball all night.”
Keira O’Neill managed 11 kills and three block kills for the Tigers, but oftentimes had trouble getting the ball to their hitters for quality swings. With postseason looming, the Tigers don’t have many easy ones left on the schedule as they look to get things turned around quickly.
The Tigers will look to bounce back against Onalaska on Tuesday on the road while Adna heads to Cathlamet to play Wahkiakum.
