VOLLEYBALL: Friday, Oct. 9, 2020
It’s been a season of close matches for the Garden City Lady Buffaloes volleyball team and Thursday night’s home triangular was no different for coach Trista Bailey’s squad.
After dominating Ulysses in their first match of the night by scores of 25-15, 25-13, the Lady Buffs then fell in two close sets to rival Dodge City, 23-25, 23-25.
The split left the Lady Buffs with a season record of 11-10 and they only have Friday to rest up for a big day at the McPherson Invitational on Saturday.
In the win over Ulysses, the Lady Buffs got service aces from Abby Parr and Mya DelaCruz. Kills were divided nearly equally between Symone Simmons (4), McKenna Jagels (4), Melody Flores (3), Mackenzie Lucas (3) and Abby Ellerman (3). DelaCruz led the team with 10 assists and Abby Parr had 12 digs.
In the tense match with Dodge City, Flores and DelaCruz had 2 aces each. Flores had 9 kills and Jagels 6; Mya Cruz had 11 assists while Parr led with 14 digs.
“Our kids were pretty resilient tonight,” Bailey said. “We came out against Ulysses and we were able to work out some small issues with our new lineup. We passed really well and got some good offensive production from our middles.”
Bailey said that despite the close loss to Dodge, she felt the Lady Buffs executed the game plan really well.
“We executed really well on the defensive side of the ball,” Bailey said. “We were able to get some quality touches against their middle, who really got loose on us the last time we played.”
Making the big plays down the stretch was the biggest shortcoming for the Buffs against the Lady Demons, Bailey said.
“Towards the end of both sets, we couldn’t capitalize on offense,” she said. “Our middles carried us all night, but we just could not seem to make back-to-back big offensive plays when we needed to.”
The Lady Buffs played with senior outside hitter Julie Calzonetti, one of the team’s top outside hitters.
“We are without Julie’s services for the time being,” Bailey said of Calzonetti.
Garden City High School 