BATTLE MOUNTAIN - The Battle Mountain High School varsity volleyball team made the short trip to Winnemucca this past weekend for the State Farm Insurance Volleyball Classic at Lowry High School.
The tournament featured nine teams, including Idaho schools Middleton and Nampa, and Nevada 3A schools Lowry, Elko, Spring Creek, Churchill County, Dayton and Fernley.
For Friday's action the Lady Longhorns were in a pool with Churchill County (Fallon), Dayton, Spring Creek and Middleton.
Battle Mountain opened with Churchill County and lost 25-10 and 25-6, in what BMHS head coach Sondra Torgerson called an uneventful match.
"We weren't in the game mentally from the start and never did get into it," Torgerson said.
Kelsey Kroll had two kills and one block, Daisy Hernandez five digs and Amanda Wallock two digs. Samantha Samuelson, Gabby Cruz, Kalin Nelson and Pooja Bhakta all had one dig. Bhakta also had a team-high six assists and Hannah Hale led the way with four kills.
Battle Mountain shook off the opening loss and bounced back with a 25-16, 17-25 and 15-8 win over Spring Creek.
"We hit the court ready to play this match and played with a lot more confidence and enthusiasm," added the coach. "I was proud of the girls for responding so positively after losing the second game. We are a very young team still playing without our only returning starter from last year. So this victory was very important to us mentally and also for the point system we have in the 2A league."
Samuelson, Kroll and Nelson each had six kills for the Lady Longhorns, while Hale added three kills. Bhakta led in digs with four, while Samuelson added three, Hernandez two and Wallock, Cruz and Kroll one each. Kroll finished with five blocks, Nelson and Hale each had two and Bhakta and Hernandez had 14 and four assists, respectively. Samuelson served four aces, Bhakta added three and McKenzie Huddleston and Wallock had one apiece.
Up next for Battle Mountain was Dayton, who played in the 3A state championship last year, losing to Truckee. The Dust Devils posted the two-set win with scores of 25-14 and 25-14.
"Even though the score doesn't show proof, I felt that we played one of our better defensive games for the day," Torgerson said.
Gabby Cruz had a team-high seven digs, while Samuelson added five, Nelson and Bhakta two each and Hernandez one. Samuelson, Kroll, Huddleston, Hernandez and Nelson each had an ace, while Samuelson and Hale ended with four kills apiece. Kroll added three kills and Nelson and Hernandez one each. Kroll and Hale each had one block, while Bhakta led the Lady Longhorns with 12 assists and Huddleston had one.
During the final match of pool play, Battle Mountain lost 25-12 and 25-17 to Middleton. Samuelson had one ace, one kill and four digs, while Cruz added two digs. Wallock finished with one dig, Hernandez had one dig and one kill and Nelson one kill and one assist. Hale had two blocks and one kill and Bhakta had four assists, two digs and one kill.
The Lady Longhorns finished fourth in their pool, putting them in a play-in game against West Wendover from the other pool, who forfeited.
Battle Mountain advanced to play Elko, who was the No. 1 seed from the other pool. The Indians defeated the Lady Longhorns 25-10 and 25-13. Torgerson said the team did not play well at all against Elko.
Cruz led Battle Mountain with nine digs, while Wallock added one kill, Maleni Cruz one dig and Samuelson four digs. Kroll had three kills, two blocks and one ace and Huddleston two digs and two assists. Hernandez contributed one assist, Nelson three kills and two digs, Hale two kills and Bhakta six assists, one dig and one ace.
The loss put Battle Mountain in the loser's bracket against Dayton, where the Dust Devils won 25-14 and 25-22 to eliminate the Lady Longhorns.
"We lost the match in two games but at least the girls played much better than in the previous match against Elko," Torgerson said. "The first game we were tied 8-8 before allowing one of the Dayton servers to score six straight points. In the second game we were tied a couple of times at 9-9, 17-17 and 20-20. We finally gave our fans something to get excited and cheer for. The girls played pretty well the second game."
Bhakta led the team with 12 assists to go with one ace, while Hale added two kills and one block and Nelson four kills, two digs and one ace. Hernandez had five digs, one ace and one assist; Kroll four kills, three blocks and one ace; Samuelson six digs, three kills and two aces; and Wallock five digs.
"I believe that this team has a lot of potential," Torgerson said. "The problem with volleyball is that once that first contact is messed up then it is hard to get a good set and makes getting a solid hit pretty tough. We need to improve our passing, which in effect will improve the setting, and that will give us more consistent sets so that the hitters can start pounding the ball."
Battle Mountain hosts the Longhorn Invitational Tournament Friday and Saturday. The Longhorns will play their first game at 10 a.m. at the high school gym. The JV will be playing at the junior high gym.
"Having Abbie (Mikelson first-team division player last year) back will make a difference at the net for us defensively," said the coach. "But we have to pass better in order to use our hitters more efficiently. We will finally have our entire team able to play this weekend which will be nice so that we can move forward and begin to gel as a team. The good thing is that they want to improve and play better and they are working hard."
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