Playoff party over for Ringgold, LFO
The 2018 Ringgold Lady Tigers entered the season without a single senior on the roster and, although the season had its ups and downs, the Blue-and-white still found a way to win a second consecutive Area 6-AAA championship.
Unfortunately, that area championship victory would serve as the team’s final victory of the year.
Ringgold won the first set of its Class AAA state tournament opener against visiting Lumpkin County on Saturday afternoon, but a few too many unforced errors, combined with some solid play by the visitors from Dahlonega, would be too much for the home team to overcome.
The Lady Indians rallied after a 25-22 loss the opening set to claim the playoff win as they took the final three sets, 25-20, 25-23 and 25-15.
“Going in, I knew it was going to be a tough one,” Ringgold head coach Ashley Boren said. “(Lumpkin County) wasn’t ranked very far behind us and we got matched up with a difficult area. Lumpkin County played well too. They pushed through and we just came up a little short. I thought we played pretty well, and made some good plays, but we just had too many unforced errors.”
After splitting the first two sets, Lumpkin County took a 14-13 lead just past the midway point of the allimportant third set when they went on a 6-1 run to forge a 20-14 advantage.
To its credit, Ringgold refused to throw in the towel and continued to chip away at the lead. They would stave off two set points and sliced the lead down to 24-23, forcing the Lady Indians to use a timeout to try and stop Ringgold’s momentum.
But once play resumed, Lumpkin would end a long rally with the winning point and they would carry that momentum into the fourth and what would ultimately become the final set, pulling away late to punch its ticket to the Sweet 16.
Zoie Metcalf had 23 assists on the day to go with three aces, three kills, three digs and two blocks for the Lady Tigers. Sydney Pittman had a dozen kills and four blocks. Bethany Thomason added five kills, four blocks and three digs. Jasley Brooks finished with four aces, two kills, four digs, a block and an assist, while Emily Ridley had six digs and an ace.
Also contributing for the Lady Tigers (22-23) was Mckenna Mercer (three digs, two kills, one block), Gracie Milford (one ace, one dig), Abby Roach (one kill) and Melanie Severns (one block).
“I told them in the huddle afterward, usually at this time some teams are saying goodbye to their seniors,” Boren added. “But we don’t have to because this same team is going to be back next year. We did very well this season, but I’m already looking forward to next season. We aren’t losing any seniors and I’m very excited about that.”
In the day’s other first-round match, also contested at Ringgold, No. 9-ranked Jackson County pulled the mild upset with a victory against No. 6-ranked Sonoraville. Lumpkin County will travel to Jackson County in the next round.
LFO falls to East Hall
Catoosa County’s other entrant in the Class AAA state playoffs did not fare much better in its opening-round match as the Lady Warriors dropped a 3-0 decision to East Hall in a match played at Morgan County High School on Saturday.
The Lady Vikings swept the match by scores of 25-19, 25-14 and 25-21.
Macey Gregg had 18 kills, 16 digs, four blocks and two aces for LFO, while Miyah Foster had 15 kills, three digs, two aces and one block. Alesya Mcburnett finished with 11 assists to go with three kills, two aces and two blocks and Morgan Noblitt had 17 assists to go with two aces and two digs.
Symerel Bennett finished with a pair of kills. Jadah Ownby had one kill and Sheyenne Dunwoody chipped in with two digs and one ace for the Lady Warriors, who ended the season with a 16-20 overall record.