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Comets take care of Mustangs

T-R PHOTO BY ANDREW ABADIE - BCLUW’s Kennedy Williams (11) goes up for the attack against East Marshall’s Faith Bandstra, far left, as Jade Hammers (4) looks on during Tuesday’s NICL West Division volleyball match in Conrad. The Comets swept the Mustangs in three sets.

CONRAD — According to the scoreboard on Tuesday night, BCLUW swept East Marshall. Despite the result, the game’s aftermath was a tale of two cities for the two respective teams.

BCLUW won 25-15, 25-20, 25-19 in the NICL West Division showdown, but head coach Kristen Garber found her team’s effort to be concerning.

“I thought we came and played just very OK,” Garber said. “I felt like we never played up to our potential. We didn’t take advantage of some opportunities that we had and I really wasn’t pleased with our intensity tonight. I am pleased with the win. I feel like we got out of it but I feel like we missed an opportunity to show what we can do tonight.”

Ironically, East Marshall coach Terri Westendorf felt that the loss was a valuable learning tool for her young team.

“We have trouble terminating the balls sometimes,” Westendorf said. “That’s kind of been our nemesis. I just feel like there wasn’t a girl out there who wasn’t giving me everything they got. Absolutely great defense. We picked up some great balls, we had some great serves going over so I give the girls a lot of credit. They didn’t have any quit in them. Down two sets they still come back and played really hard.”

T-R PHOTO BY ANDREW ABADIE - BCLUW’s Lizzie Garber (2) and Madison Ubben (10) contend for a ball at the net as East Marshall’s Emma Pfantz (1) and Clare Veren (5) await the return during Tuesday’s volleyball match in Conrad.

The Comets (9-5, 2-0) opened the first set with a 16-10 lead that helped them cruise to the win.

However, the Mustangs’ defense, which accounted for 59 digs, kept up the pressure on BCLUW. The two teams traded seven ties and four lead changes before the Comets pulled ahead 20-15. Even with the lead, the Mustangs cut the deficit to 20-19 before BCLUW closed out the set with a 4-1 run.

East Marshall (2-14, 0-2) never faded away and tied Set 3 at 18-18. The Comets took advantage of the Mustangs’ lack of offense and went on 6-1 run to win the set.

“Our attack is something that has been giving us fits,” Westendorf said. “As we went through the game I just kind of feel like the girls had more grit, more digging. Once they started to get some of those digs up they started to really play on fire.”

Garber’s message to her team in between sets was to focus on their own play and fix their miscues.

T-R PHOTO BY ANDREW ABADIE

“I told that them we needed to care of what we needed to take care of on our side of the court,” Garber said. “We just needed to keep swinging. They really weren’t swinging back at us much and I feel like a lot of times that we were tipping balls that we could have been hitting. That’s what we really talked about we need to be more worried about ourselves and more offensive.

“We missed a lot of serves, which is not normal for us. We have been above 90 percent as a team and as of late we have been missing quite a few so it’s something that we have to sure up and do better at.”

BCLUW had 18 attack errors compared to East Marshall’s 10, but even with the offensive miscues, Garber gave credit to the Mustangs.

“[East Marshall was] scrappy,” Garber said. “I thought we had a lot of pretty solid attacks at the nets. They played up. They didn’t have a lot of offense to put back at us but they kept a lot of balls off the floor. I was very impressed with that from them.”

For Westendorf, the match was an important growing experience for her team.

T-R PHOTO BY ANDREW ABADIE

“We have a lot of girls that need varsity experience in great games [and] tight games like this,” Garber said. Every time we stay in a game like this and work hard and show that we have some great things going on it gives them more confidence.”

“I give credit to the girls for learning as they are going, identifying as they are going, and trying to fix what they know that they screwed up. If they continue to do that than they are going to get better every game.”

Leading East Marshall was Clare Veren who had three kills to go with five digs while BCLUW was led by Madison Ubben who had 11 kills with 11 digs and three aces.

BCLUW will go on the road on Sept. 24 to play South Hardin. East Marshall will return home on Sept. 24 to play AGWSR.

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