Crawfordsville and Fountain Central used Thursday’s non-conference volleyball match for entirely different reasons.
The 3-0 win for the Athenians was the last of a back-to-back-to-back, and after a tough match Wednesday against Tri-West, they used the game to regroup.
The Mustangs, with only one junior and not a single senior on the roster, continues their season of building a young team.
The 25-6, 25-7, 25-13 win moves Crawfordsville to 16-6 on the season, while FC drops to 1-17.
“First, a shoutout to the Athenians tennis team who won the Sagamore championship tonight,” said C’ville coach Kelly Johnson. “It’s been three tough nights, with a county match, then a conference match, and then an area rival.”
Crawfordsville got solid stats from the regular suspects, and a few others got some hits in.
Macy Bruton continues to lead the state in kills, adding 20. She had seven digs, putting her at 994 for her career. She also had three aces.
Hallie Gayler had 10 kills and an ace. Devan Johnson had three kills, followed by Kaydence Brost and Brooklyn Mills with one each.
Jessica Tribble had 30 assists, four service aces and one kill. Hallie Elliott had five digs and an ace, while Samantha Rohr added a pair of aces and a dig. Elyce Widmer had three digs and an ace.
“It was a good night for us to work on things on our side of the court,” Johnson said.
“We are a super-young team,” Mustangs coach Alyssa Larson said, “but we are making better decisions as nights go on. We didn’t fold tonight - three weeks ago we probably would have folded against Crawfordsville. We made Crawfordsville earn their points - we didn’t give them many. We didn’t always finish some of our attacks, but against a good team like they are, it is hard to finish. I made some changes in the third set, and some of them paid off. The team handled the in-game changes well. Earlier in the season, that would have been a problem. It’s a sign of maturity.”
Larson singled out a couple of her players.
“Hannah Prickett passed the ball really well,” Larson said of the sophomore, who led her team with 12 digs. “We also had Bryleigh McTagertt who got a lot of touches on balls at the net. She got some deflections, got a couple blocks on Bruton. She did a nice job.” The freshman finished with four blocks.
“Kudos to FC,” Johnson said. “I’ve been there over the years, with a really young team learning their way. They are young, but that experience will come, and they will get better.”
Both teams are in tournaments this Saturday.
The Mustangs are at the Bi-County, being played in Attica. They play Seeger first, with Covington and Attica the other two teams.
The Athenians travel to Clinton Central Saturday for a four-team affair. Logansport and Heritage Christian are the other teams involved. They are at WeBo next Tuesday and have Danville at home next Thursday.
