By ROY HESS, Staff Writer
With its mixture of experienced players and newcomers, the Brownsville Veterans Memorial volleyball team appears to be coming of age with every match it plays.
An example of that came Saturday as the Lady Chargers played well at the most opportune moments to prevail over a veteran Hanna squad 28-26, 25-22, 25-22 in a District 32-6A match at the Brownsville Veterans gym for a share of the 32-6A lead.
“I think so,” Lady Chargers coach Lisa Mares said when asked if she sees her team gaining confidence, maturing and coming together more and more as the season progresses. “There are still definitely a lot of things we need to work on, and that’s a good thing because at this point of the season you don’t want to hit your peak yet. I feel that we’re getting there.”
Brownsville Veterans and Los Fresnos are now tied for the 32-6A lead with 3-0 district records. Los Fresnos defeated Harlingen South 25-20, 25-15, 25-20 on Saturday.
It seemed as if winning the first game gave the Lady Chargers (20-10 overall) the confidence they needed to go on and finish off the closely contested match.
The first game featured 13 ties. Hanna (18-11, 2-1 district) led by as many as five points three times and looked to be in good shape at 17-12, its last five-point advantage of the opening set. Then with the score tied at 22, Hanna standout middle blocker Pamela Ellis suffered what appeared to be a right knee injury and had to leave the match. With Ellis on the bench and the score tied for the 13th time at 26, Brownsville Veterans came up with back-to-back kills by Sarah Sandoval and Bridget Himes to notch its 28-26 first-game victory.
“It was a pretty even matchup, and I knew it was more or less going to be a two-point game (in the first set),” Hanna coach Ansgar Hagemann said. “In the beginning, we had bad luck (with Ellis suffering an injury) and then we had (the) tough luck (of losing the match).
“Vets had to step it up at some decisive moments (to win), and we had some sloppy serves, and that, I guess, was a big deciding factor today,” he added. “The timing was kind of off (because we didn’t have Ellis at the end of the first game). The good thing, though, is she was able to come back and play, so we basically came out of it with no (lingering) injuries. I’ll take that over a win anytime.”
Ellis received treatment from a trainer and tested her right leg at courtside before returning to the match to start the second game. She was a force with her blocking, hitting and all-around play the rest of the way, but her efforts, combined with those of her teammates, were not enough.
Brownsville Veterans went up by seven points, 11-4, in the second game only to see the Lady Golden Eagles rally and tie the set at 21. A Hanna serve into the net put Brownsville Veterans ahead for good at 23-22, and the Lady Chargers tallied three of the next four points despite a kill from Ellis to take the second game 25-22.
The Lady Chargers again surged to an early advantage in the third game and led 7-3 before Hanna battled back to tie the score six times, the last of which was at 13. Later, an ace by Sandoval, one of the Lady Chargers’ veteran senior players, gave the home team some breathing room at 23-19, and it was enough of a cushion to help Brownsville Veterans eventually prevail 25-22 to take the match on a kill by Megan Sanchez.
Sandoval led the Lady Chargers with 13 kills, 13 digs and three aces. Also for Brownsville Veterans, Krista Lopez recorded 21 digs with one ace, and Himes and Sanchez each finished with eight kills. Sanchez also had a pair of blocks. Teammate Cassandra Valdez contributed 30 assists and 14 digs.
For Hanna, Ellis finished with 16 kills, eight digs and three blocks, and Sausha-Rae Brown, Flora Herrera and Alexa Herrera added eight, eight and seven kills, respectively. Flora Herrera also had three blocks. Lauren Webb contributed four kills.
Also for Hanna, Yelitza Barrientos, Julie Soto and Jenny Guerrero had 17, 15 and 10 digs, respectively.
District 32-6A action continues Tuesday as Hanna plays host to Lopez and Brownsville Veterans is at San Benito.
Roy Hess covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @HessRgehess.