By Adam Kujawski, Staff Writer
The Lady Lobos volleyball team prevailed in three straight games against the Lady Raiders on Saturday at Rivera, winning 25-13, 25-23, 25-23.
Despite a nail-biting finish to Games 2 and 3, the Lady Lobos hung on and walked away with a much-needed road win in district play.
“It’s extremely important (to win one on the road),” Lopez coach Jackie Touchet said. “We lost our last two, so to have this one under our belt, hopefully it will give us more fuel to push through.”
The Lady Lobos ran away with Game 1, winning six straight points when the score was 15-9, widening the gap and putting the game out of reach for Rivera.
In an attempt to improve her team’s setting in Game 2, Raiders coach Elizabeth Avelar-Guerra brought Michelle Morales in from the bench, and she had not set before. Morales, the team’s leader in assists by the end of the match, played well, and the second game was much closer than the first.
The teams weren’t separated by more than four points at any time, and after the game was tied at 18, Lopez pulled ahead and maintained at least a one-point lead the rest of the way.
Game 3 was just as riveting. After a fast start by the Lady Lobos, an 11-5 lead seemed like a telling indicator of how the game would shape up.
However, Rivera refused to give in and stayed within striking distance before finally making a late push. Down 23-17, the Lady Raiders won six of the next seven points. The Lady Lobos weren’t about to let the game slip away, though, and Lopez came out on top with a second consecutive 25-23 win.
Touchet was thoroughly impressed with her team’s showing despite a pair of scares.
“It feels great to go home with a ‘W’ now in this district season,” she said. “It feels even better, though, because one thing we’ve been working on is our team chemistry and our intensity, and I finally saw that today. I’m so proud of the way they’ve come together as a team.”
Avelar-Guerra is aware her team needs to fight through this rebuilding phase. Having lost key players to graduation and injury, she wants her team to keep learning from the experiences.
“We’ve got to keep working at getting better, we’re a young team. We’ve got to keep working, we can’t give up,” she said. “Hopefully by the second half maybe we can be a little more competitive.”
Adam Kujawski covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him at (956) 982-6663 or via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @adamkujo1.