Soddy-Daisy's Rachel Rader, far right, tries to get a smash past two Hixson net defenders Monday night while the Lady Wildcats' Bailey Burba (10) stands at the ready for help. Hixson won the match, 3-1, improving its record to 32-12.
photo by M.A. Locke
Soddy-Daisy almost pushed Hixson to five games Monday in their non-district volleyball match at Soddy-Daisy High School.
The Lady Wildcats withstood the emotionally charged Lady Trojans – it was their senior night and Pink Out all in one night – and notched a hard-fought 3-1 victory by scores of 25-22, 23-25, 25-19 and 25-23.
Hixson senior Paige Lawson was asked if the Lady Wildcats were seriously trying to end the match after four games and get out of town with their 32nd win against 12 losses.
“We wanted to end it after three,” she said.
The Lady Wildcats had to work hard for the win, much harder than last week’s match against Soddy-Daisy.
“We knew they would come back harder tonight and they had a lot of good swings and did well on their back-row things,” said Lawson, who had 21 kills, 10 digs and three blocks.
“I think we had a lot of high energy, picked up our game and played well.”
Speaking of Lawson’s performance, Hixson’s veteran coach Janet Tate said, “It is what it is with Paige. She’s a solid player.”
Soddy-Daisy (7-15) played one of its better matches of the season.
“We’ve played pretty well this season,” said senior Alex Volker, who was credited with 11 kills, three blocks, eight digs and two aces. “We’ve had some games when were just weren’t there and some games when we were on fire. I think this was one of those games.
“This being senior night and our Pink Out game made us play harder to win, but losing really sucks because it was my last home game.”
The Lady Trojans hope to use a late-season push, spurred by solid play in most phases of the game, to their advantage when the District 5-3A tournament begins on Monday at Cleveland Middle School.
“This is starting to come together at the right time,” the Lady Trojans’ first-year coach Libby Peigen said. “We’ve worked at weekend tournaments getting the kinks out, get our frustrations out and we’re starting to look like the team we started the season with. That was an awesome team, a team excited and ready to go. I think we’re getting that excitement back.”
Tate said she saw a Soddy-Daisy team that showed a lot of improvement in a short period of time.
“I thought Soddy-Daisy played great,” said Tate, who was fighting a sinus infection. “We knew they’d play much better than they did last week. They did some things we had not seen them do before. They really mixed up their serves – they were short and then they were deep – and their hitting was pretty unpredictable too. We’re happy to get the win and get out of here.”
Every game was a catfight.
The widest margin of was six points. The other three games were decided by three, two and two points, including the finale, in which the lead changed hands six times and there were five ties.
Soddy-Daisy led 11-7, but Hixson scored five straight points – Courtney Jones was serving in the streak and also had back-to-back, point-winning blocks – to go up 12-11. The Lady Trojans led 17-14 after an errant Hixson shot and the game was tied at 20-all when Bailey Burba faked a set and scored on a tip.
Tatyona Staten delivered a kill that a Soddy-Daisy deflected into the gym rafters before falling to the court to give Hixson a 21-20 lead. Dakota Rawiszer had a kill and the Lady Wildcats had a two-point margin.
Soddy-Daisy’s Rachel Rader scored on a kill, but Staten countered with one of her own and Hixson had a 23-21 advantage. Rader dropped in a slap shot just inside the sideline boundary and Kyleigh Ward added a service point to tie the game at 23-23.
Lawson, about 12 feet from the net, slammed a winner past two Lady Trojans defenders. Another Lawson kill delivered the game-winner and sealed the match.
“That was so much fun,” Lawson said. “It was an awesome match. If they’re willing to work harder than we are, it could be easy for them to beat us. I think we handled them playing so hard really well. This kind of match can make us play better.”
In Game 1, the Lady Wildcats had a 21-16 lead, but the Lady Trojans scored four straight points by three different players – Cameron Swafford, Gracie Ratledge (two) and Kylie Brincks – to pull within 21-20.
Up 22-21, Lawson poured in two kills and a block, interrupted only by Kirshe Williams’ push for the Lady Trojans, for the first-game victory.
Soddy-Daisy took Game 2 despite trailing 22-19, outscoring the Lady Wildcats, 6-1, down the stretch. Hixson’s lone point in that spree came on a net-serve by Soddy-Daisy’s Amber Hatfield. Earlier in the game-deciding spurt, Hatfield had a backline-ace and Rader added a kill.
The Lady Trojans’ final three points came on an errant Hixson serve, an error and a slap shot that zoomed out of play on the right side.
“We’ve been struggling with our passing, but tonight we did an awesome job of that,” Peigen said. “As a team we had a lot of hitting errors, whether the ball was out or straight into a block. Hixson is big and we weren’t cutting our hands. They’ve got (Staten) and (Lawson) and they block well. If you hit straight into a block, you’re going to get shut down every single time. We never made that adjustment.
“But I’m proud of the way the girls worked. I saw more team effort. It was a good loss and we’ll walk out of here with our heads up.”
Down 16-15 in the third game, Hixson took advantage of timely offense and four Soddy-Daisy miscues to grab a 21-17 lead. The Lady Trojans’ sandwiched a Raber kill and Jones slap around a Lawson kill and trailed 22-19.
Lawson knocked down a kill near the backline, Staten followed with another deep kill and Lawson delivered a service point to give the Lady Wildcats a 2-1 lead in games.
That set up the clinching Game 4 effort.
“I think we were a little roughed up last week,” Burba said. “We had three games, a hard practice and then played a two-day tournament. We didn’t have this much trouble with Soddy-Daisy last week, so I don’t know if we expected them to come out and play us as tough as they did. We could have played better.”
STATISTICS
Hixson
Paige Lawson – 21 kills, 10 digs, 3 blocks
Tatyona Staten – 1 ace, 11 kills, 5 digs, 4 blocks
Morghan White – 13 digs, 21 assists
Bailey Burba – 1 ace, 4 kills, 10 digs, 12 assists
Courtney Jones – 3 kills, 1 dig, 3 blocks
Dakota Rawiszer – 7 kills, 6 digs, 2 blocks
Haleigh Raber – 23 digs
Soddy-Daisy
Amber Hatfield – 25 digs, 3 assists, 2 aces
Alex Volker – 11 kills, 3 blocks, 8 digs, 2 aces
Rachel Rader – 10 kills, 1 assist, 6 digs
Kyleigh Ward – 17 assists, 14 digs, 1 ace
Whitley Phipps – 11 digs, 1 ace
Kirshe Williams – 1 kill, 13 assists, 1 block, 4 digs, 7 aces
Cameron Swafford – 4 kills, 3 digs
Gracie Ratledge – 8 kills, 4 blocks, 3 digs
Kylie Brincks – 2 kills, 1 assist, 1 dig
Mikayla Phillips – 9 digs, 1 ace
(E-mail Larry Fleming at larryfleming44@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter @larryfleming44)
Hixson senior Paige Lawson, center, goes low for a dig during the Lady Wildcats' non-district volleyball match with Soddy-Daisy on Monday. Lawson's stat line: 21 kills, 10 digs and three blocks.
photo by M.A. Locke