The Lady Warriors stalled briefly, but the team bounced right back as they defeated the Faith Eagles 3-1 to win their 3rd straight match to improve to 5-6 this season.
“We were able to gain an advantage with our serve receive,” Warriors Head Coach Ashley Spicer said. “We had three reception errors, but were able to force them into eighteen reception errors. That helped us do a good job of coming back to take it in four.”
The Lady Warriors were coming off a three-set sweep on Tuesday night as the team picked up their first home win of the season against Kansas Christian College. The Eagles came out strong at the start of the match as the first set was extremely close before Faith edged Calvary 27-29.
In the second set, the Warriors had been challenged in the huddle about the crucial six serving errors and the inconsistent passing that had caused them to lose set one. The team came out determined to fix their serving and defense, and they did in a strong way. Kennedy Shelton had her best serving game tonight and led the team with seven aces. Esther Schwarze was just one behind when the smoke died down from the evening with six aces. The Warriors wouldn’t be denied as they took the 2nd set 25-12.
The Warriors continued to make adjustments and charged ahead in the third set. Although the Eagles made several short runs, the Warriors continued to maintain a comfortable lead. The third set was clinched as the Warriors took it 25-18.
With victory within their grasp in set four Calvary faltered a bit, The Eagles jumped out and took an early 5-15 lead. “In the fourth set Faith came out with some strong servers and adjusted their defense, which threw us out of rhythm. It took some aggressive front row attacks and serving runs to gain our momentum back,” said Coach Spicer. In the end great passing, improved offensive timing, and solid serving led Calvary to a 25-23 victory.
“In earlier matches this season we weren’t as efficient at fixing our play,” Coach Spicer said. “Tonight I felt like we adjusted really well after serving poorly in set one. We did an excellent job of limiting touches for Emmy Caves in their back row. Caves does a tremendous job of passing the ball for them and again I want to give our servers credit for that.”
Anna Holloway led the Warriors with 18 kills while Leah Grady and Tori Veltkamp followed with 17 and 10 kills respectively. Leah had a special night statistically as her attack percentage reached a high of 44 percent.
Anna Holloway and Jenny Her led Calvary defensively with 20 and 17 digs on the night.
The team will be back in action tomorrow as they travel to Dubuque, IA to face off against Emmaus Bible College and Moody Bible Institute.
