State volleyball
Koch digs Fayetteville out of hole for sweep
Springdale’s Jessie Davis (above) returns a shot against Bentonville at the Class 7A volleyball tournament in Conway on Tuesday. Bentonville defeated Springdale 25-9, 25-16, 25-14 to advance to today’s semifinal match against Fayetteville.
CLASS 7A FAYETTEVILLE 3, NORTH LITTLE ROCK 0
CONWAY — On the brink of losing the first game of Wednesday’s state tournament quarterfinals, Fayetteville’s Anna Koch provided a way back for the Lady Bulldogs.
Trailing 24-20, Koch successfully served six consecutive points
— including one ace — to send the Class
7A defending state champions on their way to a 3-0 victory over
North Little
Rock at Buzz Bolding Arena.
Fayetteville (25-11) won the match 26-24, 25-8, 25-16 to advance to play Bentonville (304) in today’s semifinals.
“I’m super proud of them for rallying and finding some swagger there,” Fayetteville Coach Jessica Phelan said. “It carried over to the rest of the match.”
North Little Rock (225) seemed in control early. Freshman Jada Lawson served four consecutive aces and junior middle hitter Imani Jackson provided four kills in the first game to spark the Lady Charging Wildcats’ efforts.
That all changed when Koch went to the serving line with the Lady Bulldogs needing four points to tie.
“You have to have confidence in that situation,” Koch said. “I wanted to get [the serves] in for my team and keep the game alive. I knew we had to push for some points, and serving was the start of it.”
After scoring the final six points of the first game, Fayetteville opened the second game by grabbing a 15-3 lead.
“We definitely found some fight,” Phelan said. “Winning game one carried over into game two. We made a lot of errors in game one and put ourselves into a position where we had to fight to win that first set.”
Seniors Ella May Powell and Haley Warner each had 13 kills. Powell provided 29 assists and both Powell and Warner served for two aces. Freshman Rosana Hicks added five of her six kills in the third game.
In the third game, Fayetteville scored 12 of the final 16 points to close out the match.
“After the first game, we were so full of confidence,” Koch said. “It was amped up for us.”
Jackson finished with a team-high eight kills for North Little Rock. Junior Kaylan Armstrong added two aces for the Lady Charging Wildcats.
Senior Tymber Riley came up with 12 kills and two blocks as the Lady Tigers made short work of the Lady Bulldogs (14-12).
Bentonville won 25-9, 25-16, 25-14 in a match that lasted 54 minutes.
Riley, a 5-9 outside hitter, scored seven of her kills in the second game. Senior setter Baylee Bardanier served three aces and led the Lady Tigers with 29 assists. Senior Emma Palasak managed eight kills. Senior Tori Lowry led Bentonville with 15 digs.
Springdale led 6-2 in the third game, but the Lady Tigers finished strong by scoring 16 of the game’s final 21 points.
Junior Zoe Schmidt led the Lady Bulldogs with seven kills. Junior Lauren Bench served three aces, and senior Kaleigh Breathitt led the team with 16 digs.
Kendahl Davenport, a 6-2 senior outside hitter, led the Lady Wampus Cats (30-3) with nine kills and five blocks in a 25-17, 25-15, 25-15 victory over the Lady Mounties (15-20).
Conway turned a 13-12 deficit in the second game to a 19-13 lead. In game three, Conway trailed 11-8 before staging another game-winning rally.
Senior setter Aryn Blumenberg produced 27 assists and 17 digs for Conway while senior Holly Stewart served 4 aces and had 16 digs. Juniors Anna Haley and Satera Scott each had six kills.
Rogers senior outside hitter Hannah Martin led her team with 4 kills, 7 digs, 8 assists and 2 aces. Senior Madelyn Tauai added 4 kills and 9 assists and senior outside hitter finished with 5 kills.
Lauren Thompson and Jayci Carpenter formed a potent 1-2 punch to help the Lady Wildcats advance to the semifinals with a 3-0 (25-21, 25-19, 25-23) victory over the Mavericks.
Thompson registered a double-double with a match-high 29 kills to go with 12 digs. Carpenter added 18 kills and eight digs. Setter Natalie Williams contributed 22 assists and four aces for Har-Ber, which won for the 12th consecutive time and improved to 27-6. Libero Kaitlyn Schemel also had a team-high 14 digs.
Hannah Holland led Southside (2312) with 10 kills and five blocks, while Emily Bass added a match-high 21 digs. Setter Sarah Tolbert also had 23 assists and 11 digs.