By ROY HESS/Staff Writer
PHARR — The Los Fresnos Lady Falcons wish all their playoff matches in volleyball went as smoothly as Monday’s Class 6A bi-district contest at the PSJA North gym.
The District 32-6A champion Lady Falcons dispatched the District 31-6A fourth-place Lady Raiders 25-15, 25-11, 25-15 to improve to 27-13 on the season.
Los Fresnos coach Becky Woods had little, if anything, to complain about regarding the performance of her team.
“Every win is a great win,” Woods said. “We came out on fire and we stayed on fire. I told the girls that we couldn’t get behind in any playoff match, it doesn’t matter who we’re playing, and we didn’t.”
Los Fresnos now faces either McAllen Rowe or Laredo United in the area playoffs later this week. Those two teams play their bi-district match Tuesday in Alice.
There were plenty of smiles all around on the Lady Falcons’ faces after Monday’s decisive triumph that never seemed to involve too much drama as to which team was going to win.
“We try to give it our all because we know in the future we’re going to be facing tougher teams and we’re going to have to play our hardest to beat them,” said Giselle Ibarra, a junior outside hitter for the Lady Falcons. “A win like this just helps us get better as a team so we can fix our mistakes (and continue advancing in the playoffs).”
Added teammate Ashley Tumlinson, a senior outside hitter, “Coach Woods had us set some goals at the beginning of the season and we’ve met every one of those goals (so far). We’re not going to stop here. We’re going to keep going.
“People thought we might not do too much this season because of the strong hitters we lost last year (to graduation),” Tumlinson added. “But we’re the new and improved Lady Falcons and we’re going to keep on going forward. I love playing for this team.”
Jackie Kingsbury led the Lady Falcons with 19 kills, 18 digs and three blocks. Tumlinson and Ibarra finished with seven and six kills, respectively, and Sandy Salazar had six blocks. Cassie Parra added three kills and three blocks. Ibarra also had a pair of blocks.
Also for Los Fresnos, Sarah Villarreal and Natalie Leal had 23 and 10 assists, respectively, and libero Isis Delgado finished with 19 digs.