host posted on September 14, 2009 03:38
By Robert Carter
The North Jefferson News
The old line from the movie “Cool Hand Luke” is well known, as the late actor Strother Martin drawls in his thick accent: “What we have here is failure to communicate.”
That’s been the problem that Fultondale coach Melanie Gearhart has had with her volleyball team from the get go. They’ve done well with serving and service receptions, but seen too many points handed over to opponents on mental errors.
The Wildcats were good enough to overcome those problems to score a win against host Corner in a Thursday tri-match. But they let those mistakes get the better of them in the second contest, as they fell to Midfield on successive 25-23, 25-23 scores.
The latter match was tougher for Gearhart to take because her Wildcats (2-9) had held leads in both games, only to see the Patriots take advantage of misplays.
“They’re brain dead. I tell them that every single day,” Gearhart said. “We’ve only played one two teams that we shouldn’t be able to beat. In the others, we were in very good position to win but didn’t We’re killing ourselves watching the ball fall on the third touch.”
In the 25-14, 25-7 win over the Yellow Jackets, Fultondale simply overpowered their opponents, who only dressed out eight players. Jordan Westmiller had three service aces and Monica Rascoe added two more. Outside hitter Brianna Griffin tallied seven kills.
But in the loss to Midfield, hitting and positioning errors killed them. The Wildcats let three straight points slip away in the second game when the ball simply fell between players after the set.
Fultondale was also vulnerable to tips at the net that fell between the Cats’ lines, often falling smack on the three-meter line on the court.
Diamond Stanley had two aces and two kills in the Midfield match. Kelsey Hubbard also had two kills.
McAdory 3, Gardendale 1: The Rockets started strong, but ran out of gas in the second game as they lost 13-25, 25-17, 25-12 and 25-11 to the Yellow Jackets.
Gardendale (4-8) was again playing without the services of starting setter Emi Dodson and libero Kristin Ratliff. Dodson went down in Tuesday’s match with an injury.
Bekah Myers led the Rockets with eight kills. Meagan Belcher added four more. Sarah Brewis, filling in at setter for Dodson, had six assists.
Tabernacle Christian 3, Cullman Christian 1: Sarah Walker and Whitney Galbreath had three service aces apiece as the Torches prevailed 25-13, 25-14, 18-25 and 25-13 on Thursday.
Walker had 13 kill attempts but only converted one for Tabernacle. Blair Litwiller had 24 points off her service.