GALION — Galion and Bellevue gave local fans a taste of tournament volleyball action early in the 2021 season.
The Lady Red (1-1) outdueled the Lady Tigers (0-1) in a five-set thriller on Tuesday evening, eventually coming away with the win, 18-25, 25-9, 25-27, 25-19, 15-13.
“That’s our second five-setter in two nights,” Bellevue head coach Karen Irons said following the heated contest. “We had a five-setter (Monday) night and lost (to Margaretta). I’m very proud of how the girls fought tonight after losing a tough one last night to come back. We were down 0-2 last night and lost in five. Tonight, to pull it out, I’m very proud of them.”
Galion head coach Kathleen Davis said she was proud of how her team fought back after suffering a lopsided setback in the second set and was pleased with the performance overall.
“Bellevue has a really, really good program,” Davis said. “We knew coming in that we were going to have to compete and we knew it was going to be a challenge. To win the first set and to lose the second by as many points as we did and be able to come back the third and stay in the game and be able to compete more, I think shows huge things for us — definitely for the first match of the season.”
Davis explained what she and her coaching staff learned about their young Lady Tigers squad against Bellevue.
“We know that we struggle on certain things and that’s what we’re going to focus on, but the biggest thing for us is the mental game,” she said. “Tonight showed that we have the mental game even though we’re young. We have the mental game to be able to compete and do what we need to do. … We were finally clicking and it was finally making sense, which is huge for us. We probably made a little bit too many communication errors, which is a little frustrating, but we are also young. I think we’ll grow out of that quickly, because we’re going to have to force ourselves to get out of it.”
Ashley Dyer topped all Galion attackers with 13 kills and recorded 16 digs. Madelyn Scheiber recorded 12 kills. Hailey Young put down 9 kills and had 4 blocks. Jillian Capretta added 5 kills and 10 blocks (8 solo). Jordan Roderick connected on 4 kills.
“Ashley was definitely a swinger. She always is a competitor and she always will be. That’s just in her nature,” Davis said. “Both middles, Hailey and Jillian, did an awesome job. They blocked more today than they probably have all summer.”
Ady Monk and Ella Payne each came up with 16 digs for the Lady Tigers. Sky Young finished with 9 digs.
“Ady Monk did amazing on defense,” Davis said. “She kept us in the game and kept us in rallies more than we could ever imagine. Her serve receive was really good. We got to run a lot more plays from serve receive with her passing. I’m really proud of her to step up into that libero position and do as well as she did tonight.”
Kailee Felder led Bellevue with 19 kills and recorded 15 digs. Claire Turner pounded down 14 kills. Chloe Herrera added 7 kills.
Molly Foos posted a team-best 17 digs. Emma Bollinger and Bailey Fisher each scooped up 15 digs. Brynn Vogel recorded 11 digs.
Next up for Galion is a trip to Marion Harding on Thursday for the opening match of Mid Ohio Athletic Conference play. Harding (1-0) swept Kenton (26-24,25-11,25-18) in their season opener last Saturday.
Match time for the varsity contest on Thursday is 7 p.m. The freshman match is set for 5 p.m. followed by the junior varsity match at 6 p.m.
