Eagles look for second chance in Black Hills

Chadron State volleyball did not have the weekend they were hoping for, but are not discouraged.

“The girls fought hard and kept playing. A big factor was how far away we were. The tournament gave us a place to start working with the team on what we need to fix,” coach Janel Baily said.

At the Northern State Tournament, Chadron lost three of four games. In their first game against host Northern State University, the Eagles fell in three sets, 25-17, 25-19, and 25-20. Even with Jessica Jester, junior of Cheyenne, Wyo., and Mollie Jones, senior of Longmont, Colo., both spiking 12 kills apiece, it was not enough to get the win. Later on Friday, the Eagles lost in four sets to Missouri Western 25-19, 19-25, 25-14, 25-23.

On Saturday, the Eagles went 1-1 with a win against Minot State and a loss to Black Hills State. It took four sets for the Eagles to gain the win against Minot State by finally out scoring them 20-25, 25-14, 25-20, and 25-21.

“We play Minot again on Friday and it would be a good confidence booster to beat them twice before we go into the regular season,” Baily said.

The Eagles’ offense had a slow start against the Beavers, but took off when Mallory Irvine, junior of Ravenna, made nine kills while teammates Erika Roybal, sophomore of Denver, and Jones had seven kills each. Jester also tallied eight kills for the match. Alyssa Bauer, sophomore of Rapid City, S.D., ran most of the offense with eighteen assists.

On the defensive end, libero Kristina Harter of Colorado Springs, Colo., had 20 digs that game and had a total of 61 digs throughout the whole weekend, which led for her to be crowned an All-American on Saturday.

“We are working on fine tuning our skills and reaction time so we can make every play count, go for every ball,” Baily said.

The Eagles will play in the Black Hills State tournament this weekend in Spearfish, S.D. Games are scheduled for 1 p.m. and 5 p.m. on Friday, and 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. on Saturday.