GRANITE CITY – Everything Edwardsville did Thursday evening against Granite City worked well for the Tigers.
As a result, the Tigers made short work of the Warriors in a Southwestern Conference volleyball match at Granite City’s Memorial Gym, Edwardsville taking a 25-8, 25-12 win over Granite to go to 11-3 overall, 1-0 in the SWC; Granite City fell to 5-6 overall, 0-2 in the league.
“The girls did a really nice job,” said Tiger coach Jami Parker. “They made very few unforced errors, they played some clean ball; they did nice work tonight. It was such a team effort; we had a number of players who had a number of kills, the defense played well. We had to change our lineup a little bit tonight (due to injury), to the girls played out of system and everyone did their jobs tonight. They got the job done.
“I was very proud of the girls tonight; everybody just stepped up and got down to business. They knew what they had to do; they worked together really well, and that’s the strength of this team – how well the work together and how well they take care of one another.”
Granite City has been on a tough stretch of matches in recent days, playing almost every day. Warrior coach Ginger Harrison didn’t make excuses, however. “It was rough,” Harrison said. “That was not the team that has played for me all season. They had a hard time getting going and by the time they could find some plays, it was over. Not making excuses, but tonight is is their 13th (match) in 14 days. We piled some games early in our season and it’s a big week here at school; there’s a lot going on, and I think we hit a wall tonight before they even got into the gym.
“They’re (Edwardsville’s) a good team. Kate Martin is an excellent player and hit some excellent balls, but we prepared for them and we didn’t execute the things we prepared for.”
The Tigers, with Martin and Rachel Verdun leading the way, got off to a 9-1 lead in the opener, forcing the Warriors to call time out to try to stop the momentum. Edwardsville kept building the momentum, building the lead to 16-5 before another time out, and quickly closed out the first game. The Tigers quickly built a lead in Game 2, getting out to a 9-3 lead before the Warriors cut it to 9-6. But that was a close as Granite could come, EHS getting out to 13-8 and building on it, eventually taking a 20-10 lead and scoring the final five points at 20-11 to close out the match.
Martin had nine kills for Edwardsville on the night to go with one block and scored six points on serve with an ace; Verdun had 11 points on serve with three aces and added 15 assists and seven kills. Shelbey Saye had six kills and 11 assists on the night to go with nine points and an ace.
The Tigers host Belleville Althoff at 5 p.m. Tuesday and East St. Louis at 4:30 p.m. Thursday, while the Warriors welcome Civic Memorial, Red Bud, Highland and Piasa Southwestern to their Fall Classic tournament at Memorial Gym beginning at 9 a.m. Saturday.
