Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First

Kimball takes third at Gordon tournament

The Kimball High Volleyball teams are corning off a very busy week and after a 3-0 start, are now 6-3 on the season.

"We just finished a very tough week of competition" said coach Vicki Mitchell. "The varsity players had eight games from Tuesday through Saturday."

The Kimball ladies had a strong start with wins over Bridgeport, 25-17 and 25-14, and over Garden County, 25-8 and 25-13, in the triangular at Bridgeport. On Thursday night in the season home opener with Mitchell and Potter Dix, the Lady Longhorns fell 25-23 and 25-20 to Mitchell and 25-23, 19-25 and 25-15 to Potter Dix.

"We had a rough night in front of the home crowd for the first time. We didn't look like the same team that we did on Tuesday. In both the Mitchell and Potter Dix matches we had numerous unforced errors that allowed our opponents to score points. Hitting errors and missed serves, which had not been a problem up until Thursday, were the deciding factors in those two matches," said coach Mitchell.

On Saturday, the Lady Longhorns had an early departure as they travelled to Gordon for tournament action where they went 3-1 on the day and wound up third. The first three games were in pool play and Kimball lost to St. Paul, the eventual champion, in two sets of 25-14 and 25-14. After the slow start, coach Mitchell said her girls regrouped and came back to defeat Crawford 25-21 and 25-9, won over Hemingford 25-23 and 25-21, all in pool play, and then handled the hosting Gordon-Rushville team 25-12 and 25-18 to capture third place.

The combined freshman-JV team also finished in third place in their division with a 2-1 record as coach Mitchell held eight players for varsity and used eight for the JV division. The junior varsity team is now 3-2 on the season and the freshman team is 1-0.

Coach Mitchell said, "We came together as a team at Gordon. We can find positive stats for every player. Our season highlights for the season so far show Madison Biesecker leading the team in set assists, Danika Daum in kills, Ali Hunsaker and Raelynn Hinton in digs, and Madie Snyder and Ali in serve receptions."

This week Kimball was at Hemingford on this past Tuesday evening in a triangular involving Gordon-Rushville. Tonight (Thursday, Sept. 18) Pine Bluffs comes to Kimball for freshman-JV and varsity play beginning at 5 p.m. On Tuesday, Sept. 23, there is JV-varsity play at Alliance at 5 p.m.