Spartans sweep Bowling Green on senior night
Published 10:10 pm Thursday, September 19, 2019
Thursday was senior night for the South Warren volleyball team, and Sophie Pemberton wanted to celebrate with a win against a District 14 opponent.
The senior outside hitter recorded 10 kills in an important second set before helping the Spartans finish the 3-0 (25-20, 26-24, 26-24) sweep of Bowling Green.
“Bowling Green is a really good team. We knew that we had to come out strong from the start,” Pemberton said. “We started off a little rough, but we knew we had to build up our energy and I think senior night just kind of helped us know that we wanted to end on a good note on senior night.”
Bowling Green used a 3-0 run to take a 21-18 lead in the second set after dropping the first set to the Spartans. Following a South Warren timeout, Pemberton got her seventh kill of the set to get her team back on track.
Charli Hodges recorded a kill to put the Lady Purples three points away from evening the match at a set each, but a kill from senior Erin Nerland got South Warren within two and forced Bowling Green coach Amy Wininger to call a timeout.
Lexi Button recorded a kill out of the timeout and Pemberton followed with back-to-back kills, the second of which came with a softly placed ball that found a hole in Bowling Green’s defense. She accounted for her team’s third straight point out of another timeout to make it 24-22.
“We knew that we had to end that set well because if they won that set, then that could have changed things a lot,” Pemberton said. “I knew I had to go back there and serve and just get it in and try to be aggressive.”
A service error and a block from Kelci Morrison evened the match before the Spartans finished off the set 26-24 to take a 2-0 advantage.
“I think we just started serving a little more aggressive – not that we were serving really easy, but they stayed in system for most of the night and it caused a lot of problems on us defensively,” South Warren coach Justin Griffin said. “I think we went back there and served a little more aggressive, got them out of system a little more and it made it a little bit easier on our side when the ball came over.”
Layla Jackson served up three straight balls Bowling Green couldn’t return in the third set to give South Warren a 16-13 advantage. It was followed by a kill from Pemberton, who finished with 16 in the match.
The Lady Purples battled back and eventually drew even at 24-all with a kill from Hodges and an ace from Morrison. Lexi Button gave the Spartans a lead with her fifth kill and Pemberton finished the match by one-timing the ball into the far right corner.
South Warren took the first meeting of the season between the two teams 3-0 (25-17, 25-18, 26-24). Bowling Green came out with a new lineup Thursday in the second meeting and it paid off early as the Lady Purples were able to keep the match closer through the first two sets. The two were even at 18-all in the first before a 3-0 run gave the Spartans a lead they wouldn’t surrender.
“This is our first roll up of a new lineup,” Wininger said. “I was so proud of the selflessness of the girls and their buy-in and their trust in me because it was nothing we’d even practiced, but it was something I just felt led to and I brought it out to them and they were selfless in adapting to it, so I was thrilled about it.”
Bowling Green fell to 9-10 overall and 2-5 in district play. The Purples will look to snap a four-game skid Tuesday when they host Christian County.
South Warren moved to 16-4 and 6-2 against District 14 opponents. The Spartans are scheduled to host Greenwood at 7 p.m. Tuesday. The Lady Gators beat South Warren 3-2 (25-21, 22-25, 21-25, 25-14, 15-9) in the first seeding game and also had a 2-1 (21-25, 25-22, 15-9) win over the Spartans at the Bluegrass Invitational Volleyball Tournament in August.
“I think we’ll be ready, but I think, for us, we’ve just got to make sure we take care of the ball when it’s on our side and I’m sure they would say the same thing,” Griffin said. “Hopefully we go in and play with confidence and just see what happens.”{&end}