Young Lady Lions exit district tourney
PRAIRIE GROVE — Prairie Grove punched its ticket to the Class 4A State volleyball tournament at Brookland this week with a big win (2520, 26-24, 25-15) over Gravette on Tuesday of last week.
The teams met in the District 4A-1 volleyball tournament quarterfinals at Prairie Grove’s Tiger Arena with the host Lady Tigers (No. 3 South) beating Gravette (No. 2 North) to advance into the tournament semifinals on Wednesday, Oct. 19 against No. 1 South Christian.
Prairie Grove coach Lindsey Biocic expressed joy over the program’s first trip to state since the 2014 season when the Lady Tigers knocked off Class 4 State tournament host, Lonoke, in the first round.
“Gravette’s a good team, they’re a wellcoached team,” Biocic said. “In the second set we were up 7-0, then Gravette made a run. We ended up refocusing and closing out the set. That set was huge. It’s something we worked on all season, stay focused until we close it out and tonight it felt like we showed that we had that level of maturity.”
Gravette rallied from a 15-9 deficit to get back in game two. Freshman Laney Chilton’s ace started a 13-7 Lady Lion run that evened the score at 22-all on freshman Piper Batie’s kill. After a Prairie Grove time-out, Batie pounded another kill to push Gravette ahead 23-22.
Gravette served for game-point leading 2423, but Prairie Grove sophomore Ashtyn Burton drove home a kill to tie the game and Prairie Grove scored the next two points to win 26-24.
Gravette coach Britney Davis praised the 18-5 record the Lady Lions achieved.
“It was one of the best seasons Gravette volleyball has ever had,” Davis said.
The Lady Lions didn’t have a lot of upperclassmen on the roster. Davis noted the rotation featured two juniors with the balance comprised of lower grades.
“We played a lot of freshmen and sophomores,” Davis said.
The 26-24 loss in the second set was key to the match, which put the Lady Lions down 0-2 in the best-of-five match.
Prairie Grove overcame a 10-8 deficit in the third set and won with a strong 15-7 run to finish off the Lady Lions.
“We were really tight in that last game. We didn’t have the leadership we needed to pull it off,” Davis said.
She expects the program to grow in the future and build on this season.
Prairie Grove defeated Berryville (25-20, 25-20, 25-20) on Monday, Oct. 17, to get into the quarterfinal showdown with Gravette.