Seward Advances to Region VI Final Four
| Final | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | T | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Garden City Community College (8-22,) | 20 | 21 | 25 | 10 | 1 |
|
Seward County Community College (22-15,) | 25 | 25 | 23 | 25 | 3 |
The Seward County Lady Saints continued their domination over Jayhawk West rival Garden City last night in the Greenhouse, winning their 21ststraight match over the Busters to advance to the Final Four of the 2013 Region VI Tournament. The Lady Saints finished strong to take the first 25-20 and did the same in the second to take a 2-0 advantage. Seward struggled in the third and wasn't able to erase a big early deficit as they came up just short 25-23, but it was all green and white in the fourth as Seward pounded the Busters 25-10 to win the match 3-1.
In front of what might have been their best crowd of the season, the Lady Saints got out to a good start in the first, taking a 7-3 early lead on kills from four different players. After taking a 10-4 lead, the Lady Saints went flat as Garden scored six straight, four on Seward reception errors, to tie the set at 10. Seward scored four of the next five points to go back in front 14-11, but once again the Busters stormed back to tie the set at 16. Garden City took their first lead of the night at 17-16 but that would be the end of the good news in the set for the Lady Saints Jayhawk West rivals. Three straight kills from Carolina Gasparini gave Seward the lead back and another kill later on from Erika Gilbert capped a 6-0 run for the gals in green to make it 22-17. Seward continued to hold a sizable advantage to set point where Morgan Riley and Kristen Anderson combined on a block to put an exclamation mark on a 25-20 win.
The second set was a struggle early on for the Lady Saints as they fell behind 3-1 and then 8-6 to the upstart Broncbusters. The Lady Saints trailed the entire first half of the set until final tying it up at 13 and then taking a 14-13 lead on a kill from Annelise Sanchez. It was a back and forth battle for the next eight points as Seward clinged to a one point, 18-17 lead. With four straight points, the Lady Saints began opening things up and after scoring the final two points of the set, went on to win 25-21.
The third set was a disaster from the start for the Lady Saints. After playing even with the Busters for the first 10 points, Garden City scored nine of the next ten to take a commanding 14-6 lead. The Lady Saints regrouped and were able to close a 17-10 gap to 17-14 by taking advantage of three straight Garden City hitting errors. Seward climbed back to within one on a block from Riley and setter Nacole Miller and evened the match at 20 on a kill from Gasparini. The Lady Saints actually took a 22-20 lead in the set on a solo rejection from Gilbert, but Garden City finished with a fury, scoring five of the final six points of the set to win 25-23 and extend the match.
Seward came out with vengeance on their minds in the fourth. After the set was tied 2-2, the Lady Saints rolled off six of the next seven points to take an 8-3 lead. After a Garden City sideout, the Lady Saints really kicked it in gear, scoring the next 13 straight points off of serves from defensive specialist Kelci Bedingfield to blow the score open to 21-4. Seward didn't have to do much work of their own during the stretch, earning just 4 of the 13 points while seven Garden City errors helped aid the run. With the huge lead, the Lady Saints put things in cruise control and coasted to the finish line, going on to win 25-10 to win the match and end the Busters season.
Seward's offense was solid in the win, finishing the match with a .286 hitting percentage as a team. Gasparini led the team with 17 kills while Annelise Sanchez had one of her best nights as a Lady Saint in her final match in the Greenhouse, hammering down 13 kills without an error in 21 chances to finish with a career high .619 hitting percentage. Fellow sophomore Morgan Riley, also playing in her final Seward home match also had a solid night, finishing with 8 kills and a .322 hitting percentage to go along with her 6 blocks. Miller distributed 36 assists in the win and Kari Anderson led Seward with 20 digs on the night.
The Lady Saints improve to 22-15 and now advance to play in the Region VI Final Four this weekend in Hutchinson. Seward will take on the Colby Lady Trojans in the first round of the Championship tournament, with first serve going off at 2:00 Sunday in the Sports Arena.