By JIM LUTGENS
Sports Editor
The NRHEG High School volleyball team went 1-1 this past week, falling 3-0 at WEM Thursday, two days after a marathon 3-2 home victory over USC.
The WEM match was tough. The Panthers hung in there in game one before losing 25-21. Game two saw WEM win 25-19. The Bucs put it away with a 25-19 decision in game three.
"We came out pretty excited to be on the court and kept up well in our first game," said NRHEG coach Ashley Tolzman. "Our second game our mistakes and frustrations got the best of us. We were in the net, had a hard time with serve receive, and keeping it in. In the third game, we made some adjustments and came back to fight. We were able to get set up and make some plays."
Individually for NRHEG: Gabby Schlaak 3 kills, 10 digs; Camryn VanMaldeghem 1 kill, 7 blocks, 8 digs; Elsie Schultz 1 kill, 6 digs; Ary Howe 1 kill, 1 dig; Tayler Schmidt 3 kills, 1 block, 10 digs; Hallie Schultz 14 set assists, 1 kills, 4 blocks, 7 digs; Keira Lenort 2 kills, 3 blocks, 1 dig; Madi Murray 3 kills, 9 blocks; Faith Nielsen 15 digs.
The USC match was back-and-forth. The final tally in favor of the Panthers was 23-25, 25-19, 25-23, 22-25, 15-6.
"We started out slow and not moving our feet," said Coach Tolzman. "We started to gain momentum by the end of the first game, but not quite enough. Overall, we made a lot of mistakes throughout the whole match. When we were getting set up and swinging, we were successful. Overall, we were able to walk away with a win, but it definitely wasn’t our strongest win."
Individually: Schlaak 11 kills, 1 block, 13 digs; VanMaldeghem 1 set assist, 7 kills, 3 blocks, 5 digs; Izzy Stadheim 7 digs; Schmidt 12 kills, 2 blocks, 12 digs; Hallie Schultz 42 set assists, 2 blocks, 2 kills, 16 digs; Lenort 7 kills, 4 blocks, 3 digs; Murray 10 kills 6 blocks; Nielsen 1 set assist, 23 digs.
The Panthers played Tuesday, Sept. 19 against Medford. On Saturday, they travel to Wells for the USC Invitational.