Lake Mills Volleyball starts season with a straight sets win over West Hancock
(Story by Head Coach Jim Boehmer)
West Hancock @ Lake Mills Volleyball
Lake Mills 3-0 win
25-8, 25-6, 25-5
Opening night for both teams.
“I was very pleased with how we played tonight.  I thought we were better in all phases of the game than I expected at this point.  We know we have a lot of work left to do but we finally got to execute outside of a practice session.  It’s been a long pre-season so we needed to get on the court.”
We served very aggressively overall.  We served at 93% on the night.
Dottie Byars: 14-15, 6 aces
Taylor Vanek: 22-23, 3 aces
Karli Helgeson: 6-7, 2 aces
Ellie Hanna: 8-9, 4 aces
Natalie Brandenburg: 5-6, 3 aces
Finley Rogstad: 9-9.
I thought all of our servers were aggressive and trying to hit their spots.  That’s what we need to do all year and build on that.
Hitting/Kills:
Byars 6
Hanna 5
Stene 6
Rogstad 5
Helgeson 3
Ava Moen 2
Bailey Dagestad 1
Team 28 kills.
The best part of our offense tonight was our efficiency.  We did not have too many errors and everyone was smart with the ball.  We have tried hard to train our minds to play the game, and tonight they worked to incorporate that into their play and our game plan.
Assist:
Karli Helgeson: 24.  Karli is new to the varsity level and did a great job leading our offense tonight.  She played with some confidence and made good decisions on the floor.  She knows she has things to continue to work on but I am very happy with her tonight.
Blocks:
Byars, Hanna, Stene, Moen, Rogstad all with 1.
Digs:
Brandenburg 2
Brynn Rogness 3
Vanek 5
Rogstad 3
Stene 2
Byars 1
Allison Rygh 1
We have the potential to be a great defensive team.  We have great experience back on defense with Natalie, Taylor, and Finley.  Add in Brynn and I think we have all the ability we need to compete with some great teams.
When the season starts you set some goals and try to get the kids to trust the process and our girls have done that.  But, you still never know what to expect when you put on that uniform for the first time and compete.  We did what we needed to do tonight but we also know we have to get better every day if we want to compete with some very good teams we will see on our schedule this year.