Lady Panthers punch regionals ticket

It wasn’t an easy end to the regular season for the Saratoga Lady Panthers, being dealt three conference losses in the final week.

On October 22, the Lady Panthers fell to the Encampment Lady Tigers in five sets (see “Valley rematch comes down to the wire” on page A1 of the October 24 Saratoga Sun). Then, on October 24, the Little Snake River Valley (LSRV) Lady Rattlers left the Panther Den dealing a loss in three sets to Saratoga. On October 26, the Farson-Eden Lady Pronghorns evaded the Lady Panthers across five sets.

“I felt we were not as sharp as we could have been on the floor,” said Head Coach Shayley Love. “We had a busy week of games and not much time to have a full practice to work on things. I know there were also a lot of emotions with senior night, pink game and such which contributed to some of our inconsistency.”

Regardless of how their regular season ended, Saratoga punched their ticket to the 1A West Regional Tournament on Monday as they defeated the Lady Pronghorns in four sets at a pigtail play-in match in Rock Springs.

Saratoga vs. LSRV

As they recovered from a loss to their conference and Valley rivals, the Lady Panthers hosted LSRV on Thursday evening for another chance at a conference win.

Saratoga started out strong, it seemed, as they were able to put up 3 points before an error gave possession to the Lady Rattlers. From there, it was a back-and-forth between the two teams as they tied 5-5. LSRV, however, took the lead as they put up 6 unanswered points to lead 5-11 before a timeout.

The Lady Rattlers scored 1 more point before an error on their part gave possession to Saratoga. The Lady Panthers were able to score 2 points, 7-12, before a well placed return from LSRV put them back in possession. Throughout the 1st set, and the entire match, Saratoga appeared to struggle with keeping possession of the volleyball, often sending it back to the Lady Rattlers through an error during the serve or on a return.

As the match progressed, the scores showed some improvement for the Lady Panthers. The 1st set was 14-25, the 2nd set was 16-25 and the final set was the closest at 23-25. The 3rd set began with a kill from Addie Collins. The two teams would tie several times in the final set with Saratoga leading by as much as 6 points. The Lady Rattlers, however, closed that gap and tied the set 22-22 before taking the lead. Saratoga scored 1 more point, tying the set 23-23, before a kill from LSRV gave them the lead, again. An error from the Lady Panthers sealed their fate.

Collins led in attacking the net against the Lady Rattlers with 6 kills, followed by Josie Little and Cassidy Herring who both had 3 kills. Gillian Creed served 2 aces against LSRV while Collins and Maggie Elder served 1 aces each. Madi Johnson was the lead digger with a total of 17 digs, followed by Little with 7 digs.

Saratoga vs. Farson-Eden

On Saturday, the Lady Panthers hosted their final home game of the season with a five-set match against Farson-Eden. The Lady Pronghorns took the 1st set, 16-25. Saratoga, however, looked as if they might secure a conference win to end their season as they took the 2nd and 3rd sets with scores of 25-16 and 25-22.

Farson-Eden came back in the 4th set with a score of 21-25 and forced the match into a 5th set. Unfortunately, the Lady Panthers fell short with a loss of 5-15 in the final set.

Collins was the leader in attacking the net with 15 kills against Farson-Eden. Little followed with 8 kills and Creed had 5 kills. Collins also served 4 aces against the Lady Pronghorns and Creed served 1 ace. Johnson hit the ground extensively during the match with 27 digs and was followed by Little with 23 digs.

Punching Their Ticket

Despite their three losses ahead of the regional tournament, the Lady Panthers had one final chance to secure a spot with a rematch against Farson-Eden on Monday evening. While the Lady Pronghorns took the 1st set 19-25, Saratoga earned their way into the tournament as they took the following three sets with scores of 25-20, 25-19 and 25-22.

“Our play-in-game on Monday was one with a ton of energy, mostly from the Farson crowd, and our girls rallied with the energy,” said Love. “I felt like we played our best game defensively at the net with the amount of blocks we got to shut down their hitters. I was also proud of our girls for keeping their composure and pushing through to compete after losing the first set.”

Collins led in attacks against the Lady Pronghorns with 12 kills and was followed by Herring with 8 kills. In serving, Haley Grubb and Collins led with 2 aces each. Little dug 33 times and was followed by Johnson with 15 digs and Koya Roberts with 14 digs. Collins and Sophie Diaz each blocked 7 times against Farson-Eden.

Saratoga will enter the 1A West Regional Tournament as the No. 4 West seed and will face the No. 1 East Riverside Lady Rebels on November 1 at 2:30 p.m. in the Lander High School Field House.

For the season, the Lady Panthers are 10-12-3 and are 3-7 for conference play.

This season, Collins has had 141 kills followed by little with 118 kills. Johnson served a total of 33 aces, followed by Roberts with 28 aces and Collins with 25 aces. Little had 281 digs for the season and Allie Condict had 172 digs.