Wildcats sweep Riders
MINSTER — The patience paid off for the Wildcats.
Minster worked its way to a threeset win over visiting St. Marys in a non league match on Tuesday night at Wildcat Gym.
Minster took the opening set 2520, then rallied for a 26-24 win, and closed it out with a 25-18 win in the third set.
Minster improves to 7-4 overall on the year, with St. Marys now 2-8.
Coach Cami Garman of Minster said that the Lady Roughriders’ record “is not indicative of who they are. I thought they kept us on our heels at times. They made us work.”
She added that in the second set, “we were better discipline. That allowed us to get better quality attacks.”
While Garman said she has seen a lot of improvement since the start of the season, she added there is still plenty to work on.
For the Lady Wildcats, Alyssa Niemeyer led with nine kills, and Ella Mescher had eight. Megan Fortman and Lily Barhorst got five each.
Kayla Lamm led in blocks with four, while Mescher had two. Niemeyer and Barhorst got one apiece.
Getting the most digs were Savanah Bergman with 15, Barhorst with 14 and Ava Grieshop with 11.
The team had 12 aces in the match, with Grieshop (four), Hem
melgarn (three) and Jayden Clune (two) having multiples. Others came from Niemeyer, Barhorst and Bergman.
Roughriders coach Caley Yoder said, “Our main focus right now is consistency on both sides of the ball. We definitely want to see stronger serve/receive.”
She added that the team plays well at times, and at others shows hesitation.
Moving forward, she said “we will just take it game by game. Keep moving forward, and celebrate the small victories.”
Highlights for St. Marys included 12 kills apiece for Brynn Clark and Syerra Greber. Halle Huston had six, with Darcie Liming and Addie
Lauth getting three each.
Clark had three blocks, and Lauth made two.
Lily Rammel was the assist leader with 30. Rammel and Gracelyn Johns each recorded two aces.
In the opening set, Minster pushed out to a 6-2 lead with a couple small runs before St. Marys rallied to tie it.
Minster then went on a 7-1 run for a 14-7 lead, resulting in St. Marys calling timeout to try and break the momentum.
The Lady Riders picked up a couple of points, one on a block by Clark and Rammel, and the other when Minster hit the ball wide.
The teams then traded threepoint bursts as Minster maintained the lead.
The Lady Wildcats then pushed it to 21-13, the last point coming when a serve by Barhorst caught the net
but dropped over on the St. Marys side.
The Lady Riders staged a rally scoring six of the next seven to get back within three points at 22-19.
A service error and the Lady Riders twice hitting it out of bounds led to the win for Minster.
St. Marys scored the first four points of the second set with Rammel as the server.
Minster caught up after that, but another run left the Roughriders ahead by four, 10-6. The next stretch went mostly in Minster’s favor as they outscored the Blue and Gold 10-4, taking the lead on serves by Bergman.
After two points for each side, a 5-0 run by the Riders got them close to winning the set. But after a scoring exchange, Minster won to reclaim the serve, then got three more points with Hemmelgarn hitting
from the back line.
St. Marys used both its timeouts in the closing stretch, with the teams eventually tied at 24.
A serve by St. Marys that went long was followed by one by Barhorst that the Riders returned but landed out, putting the hosts up 2-0.
Neither team held the service for long at the start of the third set, with St. Marys building a 10-7 lead. The Lady Cats then got a five-point run to get in front. Scoring went back and forth.
With the squads even at 16 after a tap by Clark. Niemeyer smacked a kill for Minster.
Minster scored three more points before Syerra Greber made a scoring hit for the Riders.
Minster responded with four straight,. St. Marys staved off one match point, but couldn’t dot it a second time.