LITTLE ROCK — The Bryant Lady Hornets went undefeated in three games in pool play then won twice in the Gold Division of the Little Rock Spikefest on Saturday, Aug. 22. In the semifinals of the tournament, they ran into the Little Rock Home School Flames and, in a match that went down to the wire, lost 25-21, 24-26, 15-17.
“This was a very good team,” stated Lady Hornets head coach Beth Solomon. “This was quite possibly one of the best teams we will see this year.
“The match was back and forth all three games,” she noted. “We pulled out the win in the first game then went back and forth in the second game. In the third game, we actually were down 3-9 and came back in what looked like was going to be a promising win but we couldn’t finish.”
In pool play, the Lady Hornets dismissed Wynne, 25-15, 25-4, at Little Rock Christian on Saturday morning. They downed Searcy, 25-18, 25-16 then split with the host team, 19-25, 25-20.
In the Gold Division bracket, Bryant beat Beebe, 21-25, 25-13, 15-9. The Lady Hornets stopped Springdale, 25-12, 25-21, before running into the Home School team.
“We had a great day,” Solomon said. “We played hard and worked out some kinks.
“We missed way too many serves and our passing was off,” the coach related. “(Libero) Whitney Brown was out today but Shayla McKissock moved into the libero position for the day and did a wonderful job. Also, Sarah Kennedy stepped in and filled the additional passing position for us. It says a lot about our team that we were able to step up and overcome the change in our line-up. It says a lot about these girls.”
The Lady Hornets play their next match on Thursday, Sept. 3, at home against Alma.
Against HomeSchool, Allie Anderson had 13 kills and Raven Loveless eight. Britney Sahlmann added three and Savannah Shelton had one.
Sahlmann was good on all 11 of her serves and Kendall Selig was 10 of 10. Shelton was good on 13 of her 14 serves with three aces. Anderson was 11 of 14 with three aces.
McKissock and Sahlmann each had 13 digs. Alex Dillard contributed a solo block.
In the win over Springdale, Selig served for three aces and got 17 of her 18 serves in. Kennedy was 10 of 11 with an ace. At the net, Anderson had nine kills. Sahlmann and Loveless four apiece and Selig three. Anderson, Sahlmann and Dillard each had solo blocks.
McKissock had nine digs. Sahlmann added seven digs to go with her 13 assists. Shelton had seven digs, Kennedy five.
Anderson came up with 18 kills and Loveless 11 in the match with Beebe. Sahlmann added five and Dillard three to go with two solo blocks. Brittney Warner pitched in with a kill and a solo block as well.
Sahlmann finished with 25 assists. The Lady Hornets had five aces, two by Anderson and one each from Selig, McKissock and Kaci Squires. McKissock was good on all nine of her serves and Selig was 7 of 7. Shelton got in 12 of 13 serves.
McKissock came through with 16 digs. Kennedy had 11, Dillard six. Dillard had two more solo blocks. Anderson and Warner picked up one apiece.
In the split with Little Rock Christian, McKissock was 10 of 10 on her serves with an ace. Sahlmann, Squires, Anderson and Selig served up aces as well with Anderson good on all eight of her serves.
Anderson had 14 kills and a solo block. Selig, Sahlmann and Loveless added three kills each. McKissock contributed a couple while Warner and Squires had one apiece. Loveless also had a solo block.
Sahlmann had 20 assists. McKissock led with 13 digs. Squires had nine, Kennedy 7 and Sahlmann six.
The match with Searcy included 11 kills by Anderson. Selig, Loveless and Dillard had four each with one from McKissock and another by Riley Hill.
Sahlmann had 19 assists and was good on 9 of 10 serves with five aces. McKissock got all eight of her serves in including three for aces. Anderson had two aces. Selig, Shelton and Squires each had one. McKissock had nine digs and Warner had the lone block.
Anderson had six aces and was good on all 17 of her serves in the match with Wynne. Shelton had six aces as well while going 15 for 15 on her serves. Selig added two aces and Sahlmann one as the team was good on 49 of 50 serves altogether.
Anderson contributed 11 kills. Sahlmann had four, Dillard two, Hill and Loveless one apiece.
