By ROY HESS | THE BROWNSVILLE HERALD
The Rivera Lady Raiders enjoyed another successful outing Saturday in District 32-6A volleyball.
The Lady Raiders improved to 9-0 as the leader of the 32-6A race with a 25-14, 25-17, 25-14 victory against Harlingen High at the Rivera gym.
Harlingen High slipped to fourth place in 32-6A with a 5-4 record.
Los Fresnos and San Benito each won Saturday to stay in second and third place in district with 8-1 and 6-3 records, respectively.
Sparked by a hustling defense that routinely handled just about everything that came over the net, the Lady Raiders took control of Saturday’s match early in the first game and never allowed the Lady Cardinals to build much in the way of momentum.
“Our girls played very well together today and their defense was awesome,” Rivera coach Elizabeth Avelar-Guerra said. “They picked up some balls that I had to say ‘Wow!’ They were really going at it and making sure the ball didn’t drop in our court. They were passing well and playing smart, so I would say they played pretty awesome today.”
In the first game, Rivera took the lead and didn’t relinquish it after going up 4-3. The Lady Raiders went on to win the set 25-14. The Lady Raiders broke out of a 10-10 tie in the second game and went up for good 11-10 on a kill by Litzy Medina before winning 25-17.
Rivera led the entire way in the third game and won 25-14 to sweep the match.
Lady Cardinals coach Joslynn Torres was impressed by the hustle the Lady Raiders displayed, especially on defense.
“Game 1, my girls showed up to play and they were ready to fight, but these girls from Rivera didn’t let a ball hit the floor — it didn’t matter what (the play was or where the ball went),” Torres said. “Whatever was hit at them, tipped at them or served at them, they hustled to make it work. Their hustle showed for them in this match.
“Rivera’s girls went to work on every single point,” she added. “My girls were in it. They fought for the first 10 points (during the first two sets) and we were looking good and seemed like the better team out there because we had more attacks. But after we fell behind by three points or so, we didn’t do very well catching up. When we see that happening, it seems to put some sort of weight on our girls and we can’t seem to bounce back.”
Rivera had defeated Harlingen High in the first round of district 25-21, 25-15, 25-23 on Sept. 12 at the Lady Cardinals’ gym.
Stephanie Garza led the Lady Raiders with 16 kills and four digs. Other stat leaders for Rivera were Medina (nine kills, three digs, two aces), Victoria Zuniga (nine kills, four blocks), Mayra Martinez (six kills, seven blocks, two digs, two assists), Kourtney Shears (32 assists, six digs, one ace, one assist), and Madelaine Blanco (16 digs, two kills).
For the Lady Cardinals, leading the stat sheet were Yazmine Martinez (10 kills), Kirsten Kattan (seven kills) and Julissa Munivez (25 digs).
District play continues at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday as Rivera visits San Benito and Weslaco High is at Harlingen High.
Roy Hess covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @HessRgehess