Lady Panthers escape Morrilton

By Julie Storing
UCA sportswriting

The Greenbrier High School Lady Panthers barely squeaked by the Morrilton High School Lady Devil Dogs in a close 5A-West conference road volleyball match on Tuesday, 22-25, 25-22, 25-20, 25-23.

This victory bumped the Lady Panthers to 2-2 in conference play and 7-4 overall.

Greenbrier Coach Cindy Hartman said that the Lady Panthers worked together well in order to lock the win.

“In Game 3 Summer Richard served nine points in a row and then MacKenzie Mallet served the last four points,” Hartman said. “Both girls stepped up on the line and served with confidence. Mallet also finished off Game 4 with the last three points. Janessa Richards had a lot of great placement hits in Game 4 to help shift the momentum. Kayla Waters and Brittany Edwards set the ball well to help with the unity on offense. Waters had 18 assists and Edwards had nine.”

Senior Richard finished the match with three aces and four blocks. Junior Waters served 100 percent and executed seven kills and seven digs along with her 18 assists in the match. Senior Richards delivered eight kills and went 14-for-15 on her serves.

Greenbrier previously competed in the High School Volleyball Invitational Tournament in Harrison on Saturday where they defeated the Jacksonville Lady Devils in a three-game match, 25-20, 14-25, 15-10. The Lady Panthers lost to the Piggott Lady Mohawks, 27-25, 27-25, and the Mountain Home Lady Bombers, 23-25, 25-21, 15-8.

“The girls came up against some very tough competition and that allowed us to get better as a team,” Hartman said. “Hopefully, we can take what we learned this weekend and use it to help us in our conference matches this week.”