The Versailles Lady Tigers defeat the Dixie Lady Greyhounds in straight sets to advance in tournament play
BROOKVILLE – The Versailles Lady Tigers wasted little time to advance in DIII tournament play defeating the Dixie Lady Greyhounds in Tuesday night straight sets 25-13, 25-13 and 25-10.
“It’s always good to get here and get the girls acclimated to the gym,” said Versailles coach, Kenzie Bruggeman. “A lot of nerves showed tonight which makes sense since seventy percent of our team hasn’t been here before and actually had to play.”
Versailles played the three set tournament match while committing just four service errors on the night.
“Serving has definitely been on our radar here the past couple of games,” said Bruggeman. “We felt like it has held us back from going on runs. If we have missed serves, we’re not able to score in those chunks. It keeps the game very tight and back and forth so we have been working on that.”
“That was one of our focuses today,” Bruggeman added. “We wanted to track who could go on the longest serving run. Brynne (Briscoe) does a great job along with Brooke (Briscoe) back there. Jenna went on a long run there in that first game. Serving is going to be really huge especially in the sectionals.”
The opening set had Dixie jumping out to a 4-2 lead before the Lady Tigers evened the game at 4-4 and opened a 17-10 lead bringing a timeout from the Dixie bench. Versailles would get it first double digit lead of the night at 20-10 on its way to a 25-13 first set win.
“We started off a little bit shaky tonight,” Bruggeman noted of the night’s play.
Set No. 2 saw the Lady Tigers jump out to a 7-1 advantage and push its lead to 20-8 before earning a 25-13 second set win.
“I told the girls when we came in here tonight it’s going to be about our thirty and thirty,” Bruggeman said. “Our 30 x 30 court and what we do and what we produce. What matters is how we handle the ball on our side. We are going to keep that tunnel vision and make sure that we are doing all our little jobs to a really high degree – hopefully that will bring us more success.”
Dixie opened third set play with 1-0 and 2-1 short lived leads with Versailles using a 13-2 scoring run taking a 14-4 ten point advantage. The Lady Tigers closed out the final set with an 11-6 run to score a 25-10 third set victory and advance to round two of the 2021 OHSAA DIII volleyball tournament.
“We have been pushing a lot of mottos this year and one of them has been “grit”,” Coach Bruggeman said. “We’re not the tallest team and we don’t have the most experienced team.”
“We’re playing against a lot of teams that have four or five seniors that are starting on the court and that is just not what we have this year,” Bruggeman added. “It’s not that we can’t do it, it’s just we have to have a lot more grit to be ok. As long as we keep that tunnel vision, working as one and moving as one – that has been one of our big pushes this year – focus on us.”
