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Cougars clean it up, sweep Jaguars

By Travis Rosenau 5 min read

MORGAN -- Cedar Mountain's experience and dominant attack was too much for Granada-Huntley-East Chain/Truman/Martin Luther to handle Monday night as the Cougars rolled to victory in straight sets, winning 25-19, 25-10, 25-9 in a Tomahawk-Valley Conference crossover volleyball match.

The Cougars were led by Kendra Erickson's 14 kill, 14 set assists and five digs, while Reagyn Kleinschmidt had 12 kills and 17 set assists. Aubrey Steffl added four kills and six digs.

The Jaguars were led by Kyana Thomas' five blocks, while Meredith Miller and Vienna Thomas each had two kills. Addison Barrick had six set assists, also for GHEC/T/ML, while Willow Singleton had eight digs and Laticianna Rosales-Wegner had an ace.

The Jaguars, who returned just one starter from last year's team, had their work cut out for them heading into the Cedar Mountain High School gymnasium and held their own in a first set that forced Cougars head coach Beth Hill to use a timeout after an up-and-down performance from her team. While the Cougars just finished a busy weekend in Marshall at the Jimmy John's Invitational, Hill didn't want that to be an excuse, but she did want to remind her team who they were.

"We had a busy weekend being at the Jimmy John's [Invite] and Monday games are sometimes a little bit slow," Hill said. "But those are excuses and we don't want to rely on that. We want to make sure we hold ourselves accountable and always play at a high level, so we tried to get more energy."

After the Cougars took an early 4-2 lead in the opening set, a kill from Kyana Thomas and a serve that hit off the top of net and dropped down for an ace by Rosales-Wegner tied it up. A block by Thomas then gave the Jaguars their first lead of the night.

But the Cougars made that the final lead the Jaguars had the rest of the way. Still, the Jaguars didn't quit after surrendering an 11-7 lead after a kill from Kendra Erickson. A service error and a block from Vienna Thomas had the Jaguars down 11-9 and moments later they got back-to-back points to trail 13-11 and force that Cougars timeout.

"We went into the huddle and coach Hill was just like, 'This isn't Cougar volleyball, we need to change our mindset and figure it out,'" Kleinschmidt said. "We always try to say we take it one game at a time and after that first set, we just realized that we've gotta go play and have fun."

The Cougars started having fun out of that timeout with a 6-0 run, prompting the Jaguars to try to slow things down with a timeout of their own during the run. The Jaguars got back-to-back points late on a block from Kyana Thomas and an attack error, but a Kendra Erickson kill put the set away.

"They're a very scrappy team," Kleinschmidt said of GHEC/T/ML. "They always pick up balls, they're always around the court. I'd say their blocks are very strong. No matter what, they go up strong with blocks and I really noticed that in the first set and after that continuously."

Set 2 started with a 5-0 Cougars run that forced a Jaguars timeout, but the Cougars extended that run to 7-0 out of the timeout, getting three kills from Kendra Erickson during the run. A kill by Miller got the Jaguars on the board and ended the run, but a kill from Kendra Erickson, a kill from Kleinschmidt and an ace from Kendal Atkins gave the Cougars a 10-1 lead. Elsy Johnson got a kill and an ace to have the Jaguars down 10-3, but the Cougars increased their lead to 12, 17-5, moments later to force another Jaguars timeout. The Cougars continued their attack and took their largest lead of Set 2 with their final point of the set.

Kendra Erickson and Kleinschmidt opened the third set with kills in a set that was very similar to the second set. Just like Set 2, the Cougars increased their lead to 17-5 in Set 3 after back-to-back Kendra Erickson kills. The Jaguars got a point back on a violation, but the Cougars got a 6-0 run to lead 23-6, their largest lead of the night. That run saw a kill each from Kendra Erickson, Kleinschmidt and Sophia Erickson, along with an ace from Atkins.

A GHEC/T/ML error finished the night with a Cougars sweep.

After a bit of a sluggish start to the first set, Kendra Erickson and Kleinschmidt set each other countless times to lead the team in set assists and kills.

"We always communicate with each other, we always kind of handle each other and if anything's going wrong, we always tell each other," Kleinschmidt said of her bond with Kendra Erickson. "If we don't, we kind of just feel bad tension. But we always just kind of communicate with each other and be like, 'Hey, it's OK, move on, we've got it.'"

Cedar Mountain moved to 16-6 with the win, while GHEC/T/ML fell to 1-25 with the loss.

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