Above: Libero Emma Sweere on the bump. Beside her is Harley Connor. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Sweere)
St. Clair came to town on Tuesday but didn’t give the Cleveland varsity girls too much trouble in a 3-0 sweep.
The Clippers easily won the bookends but escaped a tight game two. Set scores were 25-12, 25-21 and 25-11.
"We played really well in games one and three and were able to control the tempo for a majority of each of those sets,” said head coach Dave Nixon. “In game two, we made a bunch of errors, including 10 hitting errors and three serving errors. That kept us from getting any momentum going. Our energy was much lower and also not as positive.”
But behind Harley Connor's aggressive serve, the Clippers assembled a six-point run to take a 19-15 lead in game two. That made the difference as the two teams exchanged blows down the stretch.
“We hopefully will execute better offensively the rest of the week,” Nixon said.
Working the entire court, Connor had five ace blocks, three ace serves, two kills, two set assists and a pair of digs.
Ava Hahn had nine kills, four ace serves and one dig. Lexy Waldron had nine kills, three digs and one ace block. Laci Hollerich had eight kills, four digs and one set assist. Sarena Remiger had six kills and a trio of ace blocks .
Greta Hahn had 26 set assists, nine digs and four kills. Emma Sweere had 11 digs, one ace serve and one set assist. Savannah Meyer had seven digs, one ace serve and one set assist. Sophie Perkins had one set assist. Melia Sathoff had two digs and a set assist. Chloe Anderson had one set assist
The Clippers, now 8-3 overall and 3-0 in the Conference, have another conference match on Thursday when they take a road trip to Martin-County West.
In the it’s-up-for-grabs Valley, the Mavericks recently got swept by LCWM. They beat Alden-Conger, lost to Madelia but defeated ML/GHEC/T.
On Friday and Saturday, the Clippers will compete in the Class A Showcase tournament at the Midwest Volleyball Warehouse in Burnsville. The top eight ranked teams and 10 of the top 11 ranked teams in the state in Class A are playing in this tournament.
“It will be a great test for us but also a great opportunity to face the best teams the state has to offer,” Nixon said. “We will have to execute much better overall this weekend to compete with these teams and need to play with much more energy.”
Harley Connor leaps for a hit. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Sweere)
Greta Hahn on the set. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Sweere)
Melia Sathoff props up a Cyclone serve. Beside her is Jersie Kelley. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Sweere)
The student section wore purple in honor of Gabriela (Gabi Hebl), a St. Clair student from Madison Lake who was killed in a tragic motor vehicle accident on September 13. Purple was her favorite color. (Photo courtesy of Jeff Sweere)
In the commons in front of the gym was a box for donations to Hebl’s family. (Photo courtesy of Hanna Marzinske via Carrie Zeldenrust)