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HCC Sports Information
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
DODGE CITY – The 14th-ranked Hutchinson
Community College volleyball team opened its bid for a fourth-straight
Jayhawk Conference Western Division championship on Wednesday night with a
3-0 victory over Dodge City in the league opener.
The Lady Dragons tied for the fifth-best
blocking match in program history with 27 total blocks in a 30-12, 30-24,
30-10 victory over the Conquistadors (1-5, 0-2 Jayhawk West), snapping a
four-match losing streak.
“We really stepped up our blocking game,”
said HCC head coach Ronda Shirley, whose team has struggled with its overall
block all season. “We’ve preached that since Day 1 and we really adjusted
well tonight with our block.”
The victory is the 25th straight Jayhawk West
victory for the Lady Dragons (9-6, 1-0) and the 47th straight win over a
Jayhawk West foe dating back to 2004.
Freshman LaToya Taylor had a season-high
eight blocks to lead Hutchinson, which tied for the fifth most by an
individual in a three-game match. She became the 28th Lady Dragon to post at
least eight blocks in a match. Freshman Molly Bergkamp and sophomore Nikki
Canon followed with seven blocks each. Amaral added four stuffs.
For a three-game match, HCC’s 27-block effort
was the third best in program history and tied for fifth-best overall. The
four matches that were better than Wednesday night’s performance came last
season.
“We had a lot of solid blocks,” Bergkamp
said. “It really improved all areas of our game. Our defense worked better
with the blocks and we passed the ball better, which helped our offense.”
Amaral, HCC’s sophomore All-American middle
blocker, had 11 kills, hitting a solid .444, to lead HCC offensively. Amaral
had a solid all-around match adding a career-high six ace serves.
Canon had career highs with her seven blocks
and six kills. Bergkamp also had a solid overall match with seven digs, four
kills and two aces. Sophomore libero KeAnne Langford added seven digs.
Shirley changed things up quite a bit and was
able to play the entire bench. HCC ran a 5-1 offense in Game 1 with freshman
setter Melissa Gmur, who had 12 assists, 10 digs and two aces in the game.
HCC ran a 6-2 with Gmur and sophomore setter Karalee Langford. Langford, who
had 13 assists, ran a 5-1 in Game 3.
“It felt good to get everybody in the game,”
Shirley said.
The Lady Dragons will have the weekend off
before opening at home next Wednesday night. HCC will play host to a
much-improved Garden City team at 6:30 p.m. next Wednesday at the Sports
Arena.
OTHER QUOTES
Head Coach Ronda Shirley
On getting back into the win column
after a rough weekend …
“This weekend we didn’t have that spirit. We
didn’t have the competitive instinct that we’ve had before. It was a rough
weekend, but we hope it will pay off when we play conference games. We have
a lot of freshmen and we hope they start to understand what it takes to play
and win at this level.”
Freshman Molly Bergkamp
On if the team was eager to get back to
action after a tough weekend …
“We were eager to prove ourselves after a
shaky weekend. It was our first conference game, so we wanted to come out
with a solid effort.”
On getting the weekend off …
“A break will be good. It will be nice, but
we have to be ready to go on Sunday because Garden City will be tough.” |
