Lady Redskins volleyball falls in regional semifinal
The Fort Loramie Lady Redskins volleyball team (23-4) saw their season come to a close on Nov. 5 in a regional semifinal loss to a familiar Shelby County Athletic League (SCAL) foe in the Russia Lady Raiders (22-4) in a five set match (21-25, 23-25, 25-19, 25-18, 10-15) that almost saw the Lady Redskins come back from an 0-2 deficit.
With these two teams splitting the regular season matchup, the Lady Raiders won on Aug. 27 (31) Lady Redskins won on Sept. 22 (3-0), the two teams were very familiar with each other and Thursday’s contest was the closest yet.
“We know each other really well, it’s not an adjustment thing, it’s an execution thing,” said Lady Redskins coach John Rodgers on the third meeting between the two teams. Credit to them for forcing us out of our game, can’t take anything away from them at all they played great.”
“We broke them in those two sets, felt real good going into the fifth. Then we went right to doing what we did in the first and second sets,” added Rodgers.
The story was the same in the first two sets; the Lady Raiders led for most of it and when the Lady Redskins were able to pull within a point or two, errors or Lady Raiders responses kept the Lady Redskins from taking the lead.
After jumping out to a 2-0 lead in the first set from a block and a kill, the Lady Redskins wouldn’t lead in that set again.
They would tie it at six on an ace, but errors and a Lady Raiders kill put them back up 9-6.
A Lady Redskins block would tie it at 15, but the Lady Raiders responded with three consecutive points again.
The kills were landing early for the Lady Raiders as they hit directly at or around the Lady Redskins block with a lot of early success.
With the Lady Raiders sitting on set point at 24-18, the Lady Redskins were able to score three points to bring them within 24-21 but a Lady Raiders kill from Ashley Scott ended the threat of a comeback.
In the second set, the point spread never went about four points. An ace from Lady Redskin Maya Maurer tied it at 15 but four straight Lady Raiders points, including two kills, put them back in the lead 19-15.
Maurer had a team high 53 assists and ends her career as the all time assists leader for the program.
A short run capped off by a kill from Lady Redskins Hannah Raterman forced a Lady Raiders timeout as they held on to a slim 21-19 lead but coming out of that timeout; a block, a kill, an error and an ace put them back up 23-21 to force a Lady Redskins timeout.
After that timeout, the Lady Raiders scored on a bump to make it 24-21. Lady Redskins Kenzie Hoelscher and Jada Drees had back to back kills to make it 25-23 but a kill from Lady Raider Bailey Pohlman ended the second set, 25-23.
“We had a lot of opportunity to put the first and second sets away and we didn’t,” said Rodgers. “We made mistakes, hit balls out of bounce, net calls, missed a serve, we had opportunities to take advantage there and put the heat on them and we didn’t.”
Hoelscher (28) and Drees (13) led the team in kills with Hoelscher ending her career third all-time in the program with career kills and only the second
player in the program to reach 400 kills in one season.
Unlike the first two sets, it was the Lady Redskins leading for the majority of it, having answers to the Lady Raiders runs as they earned the third set win to stay alive.
Kills favored the Lady Redskins as they took the Lady Raiders out of their offense although the score remained close throughout, similar to the first two sets.
After Hoelscher tied the set at 11 with a tip; a Lady Redskins block, a Jadyn Puthoff ace, a Hoelscher kill and another Lady Redskins block put them up 15-12 as the Lady Raiders took a timeout.
The Lady Raiders took their second timeout trailing 21-15 but it wasn’t enough to stem the tide.
The teams traded kills to end the set.
A Puthoff kill made it 23-17, the Lady Raiders had a kill. Hoelscher’s kill made it 24-18, the Lady Raiders responded with a kill. Finally, Hoelscher ended the set to get the Lady Redskins on the board with a kill to win the set 2519 and make the set count 2-1 in favor of the Lady Raiders.
“We just started playing it was just that simple,” said Rodgers. “We were serving better, playing better defense and running our offense better.”
In the fourth set, the Lady Redskins led early before the Lady Raiders fought back for the lead in the middle of the set before the Lady Redskins took the lead back for good.
A Raterman kill put the Lady Redskins up 6-4 but the Lady Raiders would take an 8-7 lead after using a kill to tie it at seven.
Consecutive Lady Redskins kills followed by a block forced a Lady Raiders timeout as the Lady Redskins claimed a 15-12 lead.
A Raterman kill forced another Lady Raiders timeout at the 18-14 mark.
An ace from Lady Redskin Grace Rose gave them a 22-16 lead, one of the biggest leads for either side on Thursday night as both teams battled back and forth.
Leading 22-17 after a Lady Raiders kill; kills from Puthoff, Drees and Hoelscher sent the game to a fifth set as the Lady Redskins won 25-18.
In the fifth set, the Lady Raiders jumped out to a quick 3-0 lead with the final set going to 15.
A Hoelscher kill would tie it at three and there were ties at 4-4, 5-5, 6-6 and 7-7 before the Lady Raiders pulled away for good.
A long volley ended in a Lady Raiders point and a Lady Redskins error led to a timeout as they trailed 9-7.
With a kill putting the Lady Raiders up 12-8, the Lady Redskins took another timeout.
Out of that timeout, a long volley ended in a Hoelscher kill but that’s as close as they would get.
Two Lady Redskin errors following that kill put the Lady Raiders on game point. A Hoelscher tip made it 14-10 but Carley had the set point with a nicely placed ball to behind the Lady Redskins defensive formation.
The Lady Redskins end their season as Sectional and District champs, finishing with a 23-4 record as they captured their 13th straight district title this year.
“This is an awesome group of kids,” said Rodgers after the game when asked what he’ll remember about this group. “This loss doesn’t mean anything about who they are as people. They are fantastic kids; I’ve had so much fun with this team. I love this team; they’ve been fantastic all season.”