Seward Wraps Up Perfect Preseason With Pair of Wins

As Seward County Head Coach Bert Luallen was breaking down the stats from the teams weekend scrimmages in the Greenhouse, he said it best when he said "I can complain all I want about the numbers, but the fact is, we won all 13 sets we played, which I can't complain about."  Well, with those words said, Luallen won't have much complaining to do after the Lady Saints wrapped up the preseason on Wednesday with a pair of blowout wins over Dodge City and Oklahoma Panhandle State, to finish their exhibition work with a perfect 6-0 match record while winning all 19 sets played. 

Taking on their second Jayhawk West foe in five days of preseason work, the Lady Saints went right after Dodge City, drubbing the Conquistadors 25-14 in the first set to open up a 1-0 lead.  Seward had little trouble in the second set, bringing home a 25-18 win and matched that in the third with a 25-18 victory to sweep the match 3-0.  All 11 Lady Saints who saw action in the match had at least one kill in the win, led by Carolina Gasparini who finished with a team high 7.  Nacole Miller led Seward with 11 assists in the match and four different players, including freshman Alex Wood, had multiple aces in the victory.  Defensively the Lady Saints were sharp as well as Kristen Anderson paced the team with 10 digs wile six different players combined for a total of 4 team blocks for Seward. 

SEWARD COUNTY/DODGE CITY BOX SCORE

In their final match of the preseason, the Lady Saints took on the days host in Oklahoma Panhandle State.  OPSU stayed close with the red hot Lady Saints in the first set, but in the end it was too much green and white as Seward pulled out a 25-19 win to take the early lead.  The second set was dominated by the Lady Saints as they blew away the Aggies 25-11 and Seward breezed to another comfortable win in the third 25-14 to sweep the match in straight sets.  Three Seward hitters did the bulk of the work in the win as Wood, Gasparini, and Angelina Minor combined for 22 kills and just 2 errors for the Lady Saints.  Miller dished out a team best 17 assists and Kari Anderson and Minor tied for the team lead with 11 digs.  The Lady Saints finished with 8 blocks in the match, led by 6 from freshmanLindsey Schwab and 4 more from Wood. 

SEWARD COUNTY/OKLAHOMA PANHANDLE STATE BOX SCORE

With the two sweeps, the Lady Saints end the 2014 preseason with a sparkling 6-0 record and more impressively, Seward won the six matches without losing a single set.  The Lady Saints will look to keep the momentum rolling into the regular season when they open their 2014 campaign on Friday in Lamar where they will take on Otero at 1:00 and Clarendon at 6:00.