Following the match with Starmount last Tuesday, Wilkes Central Head Coach Ashley Clonch decided to make some changes to the Eagles’ lineup before Thursday’s match against East Wilkes.
The tinkering paid dividends for the Eagles, who defeated the Cardinals 3-0 in Ronda and improved to 2-5 in the Mountain Valley Athletic Conference and 3-10 overall.
One of those changes involved the use of Hannah Shepherd and Morgan Johnson as the teams’ primary servers.
“We’ve made a few lineup changes and I felt like they were positive ones and I think they were tired of losing,” said Clonch. “I think tonight was the first time we’ve played consistently from beginning to end and that goes with everybody, not just one or two, they all played consistently well.”
Central used a late-set rally to win the first set 25-20. Trailing 18-14, the Eagles scored the next eight points and led 22-18 on the last of three-straight aces from Shepherd. The sophomore finished with four aces in the first set.
East Wilkes’ Aubri Smithey cut the deficit to 22-20 before Malaya Cowles and Karlie Anderson added a block and an ace, respectively, to close out the set.
“Our passing was much better overall tonight, which helped our hitting to be much better,” said Clonch. “We doubled blocked on (Smithey), who’s their best player and we shut her down. I felt like if we could control her net game, we were going to be very successful tonight and that’s what we did. She didn’t get but two or three kills and I think that was the difference in the ball game besides our serving.”
After Shepherd’s serving prowess in the first set, Johnson displayed her effectiveness serving in the second set.
A kill from Smithey gave East (1-10, 1-6) a 10-8 lead but the Eagles ran off the next 11 points. Jacklyn Richardson tied the set at 10-10 with a kill and Johnson gave her team the lead at 11-10 with one of her four aces in the set.
Central pushed the advantage to 19-10 on a pair of aces from Johnson and a kill from Anderson. An ace from Shepherd gave the Eagles their biggest lead of the set at 24-13 and the Eagles went on to take a 2-0 advantage with a 25-14 win.
“I’ve been waiting on that from Morgan all year. I think I said earlier in the season that Morgan can score a lot of points off her serve and that showed tonight — that was a big plus,” said Clonch. “Hannah’s really come along; her serve is just interesting, it’s very soft but she can push people off the line. I think she scored eight or nine points by just pushing them all the way to the end line and not being sure if it was in or out. Those were two big players for us tonight.”
East didn’t go away quietly in the third set. Smithey tied the set 7-7 with a block and the junior kept the Cardinals within striking distance at 15-12 with a pair of blocks.
A Corey Spicer ace and a serve-receive error cut the Eagles’ lead to 15-14 but Central capitalized on East’s miscues and pushed the lead back to five (22-17) on a Cowles kill.
Katie Prevette cut the Eagles’ lead to 22-19 with an ace but Central pulled away late for a 25-20 win.
Despite the loss, East Wilkes Assistant Coach Cassi Gregory was pleased with how well the Cardinals played as a unit on Thursday. Gregory is currently filling in for Head Coach Kassi Money, who is recovering from recent back surgery.
“They came together better than I’ve ever seen them. They played so well as a team and they actually trusted each other tonight,” said Gregory. “I told them that they needed to believe that the other person was going to be there to pass them the ball, believe that we will win this game and even though we didn’t. I wanted them to believe it and they did.”