Lady Dawgs are swept by the Lady Texans
The loss sent Burnet into a devastating two-match tailspin and reset its district record at 8-3. Wimberley avenged its first round loss to the Lady Dawgs, improved its district record to 9-1 and showed the near-capacity crowd why the road to the volleyball Oz of Texas runs through there.
The statistical record reflected Burnet’s performance. Emily Vaughan had four team-leading kills and 2.5 blocks, while Manda Martin dished out seven assists. Laura Servise dropped in two aces, and Yudith Ortiz corralled eight digs.
Milam was the Lady Texan kill-leader with 14 and added 17 digs while court-mate Leinneweber had 19 assists. Buse kept Burnet scrambling with her hits and added four aces, while Blab delivered several demoralizing strikes.
Although Burnet head coach Bethany Grissom was stoic throughout most of the match, she was pleased with the first set before the downward spiral and applauded her opponent for their performance.
“I really thought the girls had a great first game against Wimberley,” Grissom said. “They came out ready to play and gave them a run for their money. After we lost game one, we couldn’t get anything going for us. Wimberley came out ready to play, and we knew they would. They played on top of their game.”
The match opened with Burnet taking a 2-0 lead on two Wimberley hitting errors. In rhythm, the Lady Dawgs, on the power of Vaughan and Eden Sultemeir and errant shots whizzing out of bounds by the Lady Texans, moved ahead, 10-5. Wimberley, however, rallied on Burnet’s own mounting hitting errors and added a pair of aces and some strong straight-line hits by Buse and Blab to take their first lead, 15-16. Following a timeout, Sultemeir hammered again, and Vandi Vann and Mandi Lindley paired to make a solid block to regain the lead for the Lady Dawgs, 18-17.
The final stretch of the first set suddenly became a slippery slope as misfires plagued both teams. Wimberley found net on two consecutive serves, and Burnet’s defensive specialist Ortiz sailed one into the rafters as the combatants neared the threshold of a critical win, 20-22. In stepped Milam for the Lady Texans with two thunderbolts and out went Burnet with the loss.
In the second and third sets, the Lady Dawgs were stopped cold by Wimberley’s defense and were pelted heavily by an explosive array of weapons led by Milam, their rapid-firing senior with a shotgun arm.
While the game was obviously disappointing to the team, Grissom knew there was unfinished business. Quickly, she refocused and looked ahead.
“We have to move on,” the Burnet coach said. “We now can only think of Liberty Hill. We need a good match against them. We have to start thinking about what we need to do to prepare for Liberty Hill. Nothing else matters right now except that.”
The Lady Dawg-Liberty Hill rematch is set for Tuesday at The Doghouse, 1000 The Green Mile in Burnet, at 7 p.m.
In the first half of district play, the Lady Panthers knocked Burnet out of the unbeaten ranks in a firefight that lasted five smoldering sets, 25-20, 13-25, 20-25, 26-24 and 18-16.