The Western Nebraska Community College volleyball team dropped to 12-5 on the season as they went 1-3 at the Sheila Worley Invite in Sterling, Colorado, over the weekend when they faced four ranked teams.
The Cougars lost both matches on Friday, falling to Odessa College 25-20, 25-23, 25-18 and then lost to Utah State-Eastern 25-9, 25-23, 25-18.
The Cougars split contests on Saturday, falling to No. 4 Barton Community College 25-23, 25-20, 25-6. WNCC avoided falling in all four matches by registering a reverse sweep against Dodge City Community College in a contest where WNCC lost the first two sets 25-18, 25-19 before coming back to take the final three sets 29-27, 25-14, 15-10.
WNCC will be back in action this weekend when they play in the WyoBraska Invite. All four matches in the WyoBraska Invite will be played in Torrington, Wyoming, this year. WNCC will face Miles Community College at 11 a.m. on Friday followed by Central Wyoming College at 7 p.m. Saturday’s contests will see WNCC take on Colorado Northwestern at 9 a.m. followed by Gillette College at 1 p.m.
Odessa 3, WNCC 0
This match saw the Cougars battle Odessa tooth and nail and if it wasn’t for some long service rallies by Odessa, it could have been a different contest.
The first set saw both teams knotted at 6-6 before Odessa went on a 7-point run for a 13-6 lead. WNCC came back to get within one at 21-20 on a Tamika Eastman kill, but Odessa got the serve back and served out the first-set win 25-20.
The second set was just as dramatic. Odessa took an 8-3 lead after a 6-point run. WNCC came back to tie the set at 16-16 and later had it tied at 23-23. Odessa scored the final two points for the 25-23 win.
The third set saw some great defensive plays. WNCC had a big defensive rally where the players brought balls back way off the court and trailed 8-6. Odessa had two big rallies, one a 5-point service run and another a 6-point run to lead 20-11. Odessa won the third 25-18.
Lilly Zwart led the Cougars with eight kills followed by Ahleejah Tovo-Sunia with seven and Eastman with four. Tovo-Sunia also had 10 digs and eight points while Eastman had 11 digs and two points. Taylor Tyser led the way in digs with 21 along with six points.
Utah State-Eastern 3, WNCC 0
The Utah State-Eastern was the same as the Odessa match with long service runs the main reasons for Utah State’s wins. The First set saw WNCC down 13-8 before Utah State-Eastern went on a 8-point run for a 21-8 lead and won going away 21-9.
The second set saw WNCC come to play as they led 6-4 after three straight points from Tyser. Utah State-Eastern came back to lead 18-16 only to watch the Cougars Tovo-Sunia score two points on kills from Eastman and Finja Schul for a 19-18 lead. WNCC led 21-19 only to see Utah State-Eastern to go up 24-21 and win the second set 25-23.
The third set saw WNCC’s Schul get a kill and then three service points for a 13-10 lead. Once again, Utah State-Eastern went on a service run to lead 16-13. WNCC got the deficit down to two at 18-16, but Utah State-Eastern went on to win 25-18.
Utah State-Eastern tallied 41 kills and had a .262 hitting efficiency while WNCC had 27 kills with a .037 hitting efficiency. Eastman led the way with eight kills followed by Tovo-Sunia with seven and Zwart with six. Tyser led with 10 digs along with five points.
Barton 3, WNCC 0
The Barton contest saw the Cougars battle with Barton for the first two sets falling 25-23 in the first and then 25-20 in the second. The third set was all Barton as they held WNCC to just six points in taking the third 25-6.
Barton tallied 38 kills with a hitting efficiency of .292 while the Cougars had 19 kills and a hitting efficiency of .037.
WNCC was led by Eastman with six kills followed by Tovo-Sunia and Schul each with five kills. Tyser tallied 15 digs in the loss while Tovo-Sunia and Alex Gonzalez-Orozco each had nine digs.
WNCC 3, Dodge City 2
This was a match where WNCC had a reverse sweep to get the win. The Cougars dropped the first set 25-18 as a late Dodge City run opened a 23-15 lead before winning 25-18.
The second set saw the Cougars get behind the 8-ball early trailing 15-7 and never got within five points to fall 25-19.
Facing a do-or-die third set, the Cougars came ready to play. Dodge City led 12-7 only to watch Schul score four points to come within 12-11. Later, Tyser had a 5-point run to give the Cougars a 19-15 lead.
Dodge City came back to lead 22-21 only to see the Cougars take a 24-23 lead. Dodge City was facing match point at 27-26 when Zwart nailed a kill to tie things at 27. Gonzalez-Orozco served an ace and then got the final point to win 29-27.
That win spearheaded the Cougars as they took the fourth set in dominating fashion behind some big service runs that included 4-point runs by Tyser and Gonzalez-Orozco for a 13-5 lead. With WNCC lead 18-11 on a Zwart kill, Eastman went on a 5-point run to lead 23-11 and won the fourth set 25-14.
The fifth set saw Dodge City take a 4-2 lead. WNCC went up 6-4 on three Tyser points. With the score tied at 8-8, Eastman got a kill and Schul served two points for a 11-8 lead. Eastman then had a kill and service point for a 14-10 lead before Tovo-Sunia finished off the match with the winning kill.
WNCC won the hitting category, finishing with a .196 hitting efficiency and 52 kills while Dodge City hit just .133 with 57 kills. A big reason for the win in the final three set was the Cougars’ play at the net. WNCC finished with 25 assisted blocks for the match and one solo block while Dodge City had just four blocks.
WNCC had three players finish with double-figure kills. Zwart and Tovo-Sunia each had 13 kills followed by 11 from Eastman. Eastman finished with a double-double as she also had 14 points with three aces, while Tovo-Sunia had a double-double with 13 digs along with five assisted blocks.
Tyser tallied 21 digs with 10 points and two aces, while Gonzalez-Orozco had 13 digs with nine points and two aces.
Nora Marginean had 47 set assists with eight digs, while Chloe Grady had four kills and four block assists. Schul finished with seven kills with eight block assists along with six points.
