English Valleys bested by Keota after reaching Championship

The Lady Bears were hoping to finish off their regular season with a pair of wins competing at Keota in one section of the SICL volleyball quads on October 11. Their first opponent was BGM, whom they had played just one week prior, and by beating them wound up playing Keota in the Championship.

The first set got off to a positive start for English Valleys as they won four of the first five points in the set and continued that by winning six of the first 10 points. BGM went on to counter by running off a string of points to take a minimal 15-14 lead. English Valleys responded by winning the next three points, leading to a BGM timeout. Not long after that, another timeout by BGM was called to try and halt the Lady Bears’ offense, at the time leading 21-18. BGM closed the gap to one point late but English Valleys closed it out with a Kami Tippie kill to win 25-23.

“It was huge for us to win that first set,” Lady Bears coach Becky Becker said. “We stayed settled and calm even when they made some runs, but we didn’t allow those huge runs.”

The second set didn’t start off so hot as BGM won seven of the first eight points, swinging the momentum back to their side. English Valleys tried to stage a comeback but only mustered a couple more points before BGM hit 18 points. Despite being down a considerable margin, the Lady Bears were able to get some things clicking, winning several consecutive points which led to a timeout by BGM. English Valleys wound up losing the set 13-25, but the run they made late in the set went on to benefit them in the upcoming sets.

“We battled back a little bit after giving up a big run. That’s the fun part and the frustrating part about volleyball with rally scoring, you can get behind quickly,” Becker said. “This game is about momentum and even though I have a veteran team, sometimes they don’t always understand that. It’s important for us to get that momentum at the end and set the tone going forward.”

Like the first couple sets, one team found their stride early on and the other one started out slow. English Valleys was up by five in the blink of an eye and then withstood a run to stay up 9-7. From that point it was back and forth from that point on but in the end, English Valleys maintained, leading by only a couple points late. BGM tied it up at 21 apiece and again, it was either tied or a one-point difference, until Tippie picked up another clutch kill at the net to give English Valleys the 25-23 set three win.

BGM took advantage of some English Valleys errors on serve receive to take an early 7-1 lead and continued to hold a lead through much of the set. English Valleys finally took their first lead of the set off an ace by Maddy Shaw. They extended that late lead to go up 23-20 but BGM kept fighting back, each point harder to earn than the one prior. English Valleys led 24-23 and hoped to end it then and not go into a fifth set. They got their wish as BGM missed on a serve attempt to give English Valleys a 25-23 win.

“I saw them play together with a lot of trust, a lot of hop and a lot of hustle,” Becker said. “The last couple weeks the trust within the team hasn’t been as strong and we’ve struggled, so the trust in each other was key to get the win. Even out of system, we played exceptionally well.”

Cheyenne Conrad led the team with seven kills, followed closely by Tippie and Aly Warwick who recorded six kills apiece. Karyssa Westfall had a team high 37 digs with Shaw digging up 23 balls and Jessi Armstrong also had 18 digs to go along with 13 assists. As a team, the Lady Bears only missed on eight of their 87 service attempts with Shaw succeeding on 16 of her 17 attempts and Elle Ayers had four of the team’s 10 aces.

By winning against BGM, the Lady Bears got another chance to try and beat Keota for the Championship, having split their two meetings earlier in the season.

A similar start to their second match of the night as English Valleys got out to 5-4 lead but a couple of aces from Keota meant the lead didn’t last long. The Lady Bears made a run in the middle part of the set to retake a 16-11 advantage and pushed that a little further 19-12. They finished out the set on a high note, winning six of the final eight points to take a convincing 25-14 victory. The second set was much closer throughout after Keota established an early lead. English Valleys battled back several times but were unable to get over the hump and take the lead in set two. They were down 21-23 late but Keota came out the victor in set two 25-22.

“If we could’ve kept the momentum and came back in the second set then we would’ve had them,” Becker said. “We started hanging our heads a bit and then some fatigue set in for us and our minds started to wander. It’s tough to come back from and we just didn’t have the hop.”

With momentum on Keota’s side, English Valleys was hoping they could get out to an early lead in the third set and rattle the Lady Eagles. Instead, it was Keota that took the lead, putting English Valleys in a 5-10 hole, which grew to 7-16, leading to a timeout from English Valleys. Keota closed out the third set to put the Lady Bears against a steep hill to climb to win the Championship. Set four started out with close margins again but Keota was the team that held onto the lead, with English Valleys pulling within two points in the middle of the set.

They wouldn’t get any closer but were within striking distance the rest of the way, hoping to make a big push late down 17-21. Keota went on to win the fourth set 25-19 to win the “series” between the two sides. Despite losing the match, the Lady Bears are feeling good about their performance, providing a boost heading into Regional play.

“This was huge for us because the last two weeks, let alone the season, have been a rollercoaster for us. We might win a set but then go on to lose the next two, even though we’re playing them close,” Becker said. “Hopefully we’ll learn from what we did well against BGM and shore up our defense to take on Iowa Valley.”

Conrad had another seven kills in the match and four of the teams’ six blocks against Keota. Ayers also had six kills, Warwick had five kills and Westfall had four kills. Westfall racked up another 38 digs, Armstrong had 24 digs and 15 assists and Shaw combined with Warwick for another 39 digs.

“I thought everyone improved, compared to where we were at a week ago. Cheyenne dominated the net and Karyssa has taken to the libero position well. Kami Tippie made some adjustments against BGM and had some big swings,” Becker said. “I think this was a collective team effort, nobody was off. For us we didn’t end off on a low note, we’ve been looking for this fifth win all season and have come close several times.”

The Lady Bears competed at Iowa Valley on October 16 for the first round of Regional play with the winner to play HLV on October 22 in Victor.