Tribe attack too much for Jay County (10/06/04)

FORT RECOVERY — Jay County is playing much better volleyball than it was a few weeks ago. Fort Recovery was still the better team on the court Tuesday.

The Indians fought off the visiting Patriots in a pair of closely-contested games and then stormed through the third for a 25-17, 25-21, 25-12 victory.

“It took us three games to figure out, ‘Hey, we need to play better than this,’” said Fort Recovery coach Jackie Briscoe, whose team lost a tight battle with Indiana’s Class 3A No. 3 Fort Wayne Concordia last weekend. “Once we started using our middles on offense they had no answer for us.”

Still, each of the first two games were in doubt most of they way, with Jay County trailing just 15-13 in the first and as close as 22-21 in the second. But, in both cases the Tribe made the late run to put the game away.

The ends of each of those games came down to Krystal Rammel’s serving.

With the lead down to 20-17, Fort Recovery got the ball back with Rammel set to serve. She racked up three consecutive aces to get to game point, and Tiff Gaerke then ended the first game with a kill.

The Patriots (8-19) came close again the second game, cutting the gap to one point on back-to-back kills by Kelly Sautbine and Ashley Overla. But, Briscoe called a time out and Rammel took over again.

The senior middle hitter got the ball back for the Indians with a kill, then stepped behind the service line. She nailed two more aces, giving her five for the match, to give Fort Recovery a 2-0 game advantage.

Gaerke made sure the third game would be the final one, accounting six of her team’s first seven points with five kills and a stuff block, as the Indians built a 7-1 advantage. Rammel added a pair of kills, and Holly Stein notched one as the lead grew to 14-4. The Patriots never pulled within fewer than seven points the rest of the way.

Leading 18-11, the Tribe (11-7) got back-to-back kills from Rammel and then two more in a row from Stein as it finished on a 7-1 run.

Rammel finished with 12 kills, nine points and four blocks to go along with her five aces. Stein had a team-high 12 points, including three aces, six digs and five kills.

Gaerke was tops in the match with 17 kills and five blocks. Megan Wenning had 10 points, and Rachel Brackman finished with 11 digs.

Briscoe said the difference from two close games to an easy third was passing.

“We made too many errors on our side of the court (in the first two games),” she said. “We weren’t passing the ball and we weren’t being aggressive on defense.”

Jay County coach Fred Medler didn’t get the result he would have liked, but he said he is happy with the direction his team is now taking.

“We’re playing better,” he said. “Progress has been made. We’ve finally got everyone back and healthy — except Markie (Runyon). Things that might have happened a month ago are finally coming around.”

Kelly Sautbine, one of the players who missed some matches with an injury, had perhaps her best match of the season against the Indians. She finished with 14 digs and eight kills, both team highs, and added four points and one block.

Theresa Reinhart had seven digs and five points, and Erin St. Myers notched six kills. Erica Clark and Leah Gasparovic each had eight assists.

Jay County will play at home Thursday against Richmond at 5 p.m.

Following their victory, the Indians head into yet another set of matches versus state-ranked teams. Their next two matches come against the top two teams in the Midwest Athletic Conference as they host Division IV No. 2 Marion Local Thursday at 6 p.m. and then visit Division IV No. 1 St. Henry Tuesday.

“I need to see consistent improvement,” said Briscoe of how her team must prepare down the stretch for the sectional tournament. “And we need to finish the big games. We have to take care of business passing serve and playing good defense.”

Junior varsity

Fort Recovery rolled in the junior varsity match Tuesday, topping Jay County 25-10, 25-17.

The Indians (12-2) ran out to a big lead against the Patriots en route to the game-one win. They held just a 17-14 lead in the second, but then went on an 8-3 run to finish the match.

Lauren Wenning posted a team-high four kills for the Tribe. She also had two points, two digs and one block.

Abby Niekamp had 10 assists, seven points and two digs. All but one of her points were scored on aces.

Alicia Schwieterman added nine points and three kills, and Jodi Tobe notched five digs.

Jay County JV stats were not available at press time.[[In-content Ad]]