HEM digs into competition

The Hanna, Elk Mountain, Medicine Bow (HEM) Lady Miners played two games this week and came out victors in both encounters. The two wins have the Lady Miners 16-2 overall and 8-0 in conference play.

Rock River

On October 15. HEM hosted Rock River Lady Longhorns.

In the 1st set, the Lady Miners came out and took control very quickly against Rock River.

They won it handily, 25-10, but their coach felt there was room for improvement.

"I feel the girls come out and do their job," Jackie Jones, head coach of the Lady Miners said. "But I did feel that as the game did go on, they almost got rocked on their heels a little bit watching things happen instead of getting after it. To be quite honest, we had some uncharacteristic service errors and defensive errors where were waiting for it to come to us and then we we're just swinging our arms."

The 2nd set the, Lady Miners got ahead 6-0 before the Lady Longhorns scored. Rock River kept serving and the Lady Miners found themselves in a close game at 6-4. When the ball came back to the Lady Miners, Charla Mae Widdison served seven times before the Lady Longhorns got the ball. Rock River would get four more points during this set, losing 25-9. Amy Campbell tapped in the last point

The last set had the Lady Longhorns put forth their best effort. They stayed close in the beginning at 3-2. The Lady Miners started to pull away when the score was 9-5. When the Lady Longhorns would have a burst of a couple points, the Lady Miners would answer back with 3 or 4 points. The Lady Longhorns took a timeout when the score was 14-9. It helped as Rock River scored next but then HEM scored 2 points to lead 16-10. A small rally had the Lady Longhorns within four points at 16-12. The Lady Miners pulled together and didn't look back as they won the game 25-14.

Jones was not upset at the errors she saw in the sets because the problems could be fixed in practice.

"The girls do find a way to win," Jones said. "But with some teams we can't afford to get rocked back on our heels, we are the ones that need to charge forward and do our job."

Jones was happy with how Taylar Scott moved her hits around and how well Scott found the holes in the other court.

Widdison, Haley Felton and Hannah Christie also got praise from Jones on their contributions to the team.

"All three of them offer something," Jones said.

Glendo

On Saturday, HEM hosted Glendo Lady Eagles.

The 1st set had the starters destroy the Lady Eagles. The score was 25-2.

The next set was much closer because Jones put in her Junior Varsity (JV) team.

"I knew coming in what the plan was," Jones said. "I had talked to all the girls that our varsity starters would play the 1st set and that the 2nd set would be all the JV starters. Win or lose, I was keeping them all in there."

The JV team stepped up when it had to. The set was tight from the start. It was 2-2 and the lead changed seven times as both teams battled to win. Jesse Fowler placed shots up against the net that the Lady Eagles couldn't find an answer for. T'ylsa Solaas, Hanna Gonzales and Sara Sikes kept the game competitive. The Lady Eagles got up over the Lady Miners 17-21 and it seemed HEM might lose. The JV team didn't buckle and tied it up 22-22. The Lady Eagles scored one more point, but the Lady Miners prevailed, taking the game 25-23.

"If we lost, then we would have played another set, but I had confidence in the JV team," Jones said. "The girls made me proud."

In the last set, Jones intended for the varsity seniors to begin and have them pulled out so the fans could recognize them. When the score was 15-4, Jones did exactly that. The home crowd gave an ovation to the seniors as they sat down. Jones put in mostly JV players to finish up the set. The Lady Eagles did score two more points, but even with the seniors and most starters gone, the Lady Miners won, 25-6.

"I am mixing things up at practice to keep it fresh as we go into regionals," Jones said. "The seniors have a lot of poise and it was nice to pull them off the court and have them get the recognition they deserve. They are a class act."

The Lady Miners are off this week and will go to regionals the week after.