Lady Cats takes third in Archie Tournament

By RICHARD HETTINGER The Lady Cats entered pool play in the Archie VB Tournament facing Butler, Hume and Adrian in their pool. On Tuesday night of last week they ‘came to play’ as head coach Busch later states. In the Butler Lady Bears match Drexel did look sharp and played well with the following stats: Serving Points; Lane 9, Freeman 7, Gamache 7 and Collins 6. Aces; Lane 4, Collins 2 and Gamache and Freeman with one each. Kills; Hocker 3, Lane, Gunnels and Gamache with 2 each. Collins and Freeman each had 3 assists, Gunnels 2 and Vlieger 1. Gunnels also had 2 blocks. Coach Busch excitedly comments, “I was so proud of the girls; they came to play. We looked sharp; lots of communication and moving. The Lady Cats were fired up and it showed.” Drexel scored victories in both games 25-18 and 25-22. In pool play only two games are played against each team in their respective pool.
They also faced the Hume Lady Hornets on Tuesday winning easily in the first game 25-6 but loosing the second game disappointingly 19-25. At one time the Lady Cats trailed 6-24 and were able to get their composure scoring 13 straight points before Hume scored the winning point. Stats: Serving Points; Collins 10, Lane 9 and Hocker 6. Aces: Collins 4 and Lane 3. Kills Gunnels 4, Hocker and Gamache each with 3. Assists: Gunnels 4, Collins 3 and Lane 1. Gunnels and Hocker each came through with one block.
“The Lady Cats came out strong the first game. The girls were covering well and moving the ball well,” stated coach Busch. “Communication and spirits were high. We started off very slow in the second game and didn’t wake up in time to pull out the win. The girls did do a great job of holding Hume at 24 points for a run of 13 points for the final score of 19-25.”
On Thursday, in an early evening game at 4:30, the Lady Blackhawks were the Lady Cats’ opponent for the second time of the season. In their first meeting Drexel went down in two games, not to be the case this night as the Lady Cats came out strong. The entire team served well and took control of the game from the beginning with Megan Lane serving the final point for a nice 25-21 win. Unfortunately the tide turned in the second game as Adrian wins 25-18. As there is only two games played in each match in pool play, this gave the Lady Blackhawks the edge in score and put them in the best bracket for tournament play which was played in it’s entirety on Saturday. Final standings in Pool A play was #1 Adrian, #2 Drexel, #3 Hume and finishing #4 was the Butler Lady Bears. In Pool B KC Lutheran ran away with it being undefeated, Archie and Ballard each went 3 and 3 for 2nd and 3rd and Miami finished 4th.
Stats for Adrian Pool Play: Serving Points Gunnels, Freeman and Collins 5 each. Aces: Gunnels and Freeman 2 each; Kills: Gamache 4, Gunnels 3, Lane and Freeman with 2; Assists: Gunnels 4 and Collins 1; Blocks: Gunnels 1 and Hocker 1. Coach Busch commented “This was an off night for the Lady Cats. Even the most basic skills, such as passing, were not there. Hopefully this is out of our system and we can go full force into bracket play.”
The Lady Cats started play...
Read the complete story in the September 17th edition.