Spartans run over ‘Cats

The Custer girls volleyball team’s record is now at 5-5 after a loss to Class AA school, Spearfish in a game at home last Thursday. The 4-5 Spartans won the match in straight sets, 15-25, 22-25 and 18-25.

In keeping with co-head coach Jill Hohn’s earlier comments about the team having trouble getting its game going early on, the girls struggled to get momentum in set one. The Spartans got off to an early lead and ended up winning by 10 points. 

“We typically do have slow starts and this game was no different,” said Hohn. “We also had difficulty starting our offense and completing key serves.”

By the beginning of set two, the Wildcats seemed to have found their mojo and led for the first half of the game, eventually getting a four point lead before Spearfish came back to tie up the score at 13. 

“We made some changes to our line up and that worked well for us,” said Hohn. “We were able to get some kills with our offense and get them out of system. Ally Cass also came through with some great consistent serving.”

Custer never regained the lead after that but did manage to tie it up again at 18 apiece. 

Set three was tied at 3-3 early on but Spearfish soon began to pull away and won the game and match with their 25-18 victory over the ‛Cats. 

“We had some definite issues with communication, particularly in serve receive,” said Hohn. “We were not adjusting to their serves like we should have been. We also struggled with playing cohesively as a team.”

“Spearfish obviously has a good team,” said Hohn, “but our mistakes are what ultimately lost the game for us. Between hitting errors, serving errors, and defensive miscommunications we really lost because of our mistakes.”

One of the Wildcat standouts in the game was Darian Block who the coach said did a good job reading the Spartans’ defense.  

“She was able to come away with some nice kills,” said Hohn. 

On Tuesday this week the Wildcats hosted a rematch with the Douglas Patriots whom they beat in four sets earlier in the season. On Thursday they travel to the Northern Hills to face the Lead-Deadwood Golddiggers for the first time this season.