By ROY HESS, Staff Writer
Los Fresnos and Brownsville Veterans Memorial are familiar foes as far as district volleyball matchups are concerned. They emerged from highly competitive district races as co-champions during each of the past two seasons.
Tuesday’s District 32-6A match at Brownsville Veterans was no different as each team came into the contest with a 5-0 record and was looking to remain atop the district standings.
The Lady Falcons, ranked No. 2 in the Rio Grande Valley, are the ones who stayed unbeaten in district thanks to a 25-21, 25-17, 20-25, 25-15 triumph over the No. 6 Lady Chargers.
Los Fresnos (29-8, 6-0 district) faces another important challenge at home against No. 9 Hanna (21-11, 5-1) at noon Saturday as the first round of district play comes to a close. Hanna won at home against Rivera on Tuesday in a match that went to five games to set up Saturday’s showdown.
Tuesday marked the first time this season that Los Fresnos was taken to more than three games in district action.
“ (Brownsville) Veterans came out ready to play, and we came out to play,” Lady Falcons coach Becky Woods said. “It was just a matter of whoever was going to be in the right place on the floor at the right time to win this one.
“It wasn’t an easy win,” she added. This was the first time anyone has taken us to four games. I told our girls, ‘We’re going to see what we’re made of, because down the road there’s going to be a lot more matches that go to four games (and possibly beyond).’”
Joseline Caraveo led Los Fresnos with 20 kills, and teammates Sam Ibarra and Jackie Kingsbury each had 11. Ibara, Caraveo and Kingsbury finished with 11, eight and seven blocks, respectively. Giselle Ibarra added six kills and five blocks.
Also for the Lady Falcons, Miranda Gonzales had 32 assists and Kingsbury added. 11. Concerning digs, Isis Delgado, Liz Ramirez and Giselle Ibarra had 24, 21 and 15, respectively.
For the Lady Chargers (22-11, 5-1), Sarah Sandoval had 13 digs and eight kills, and Cassie Valdez had 32 assists and 16 digs. Ashley Tumlinson contributed seven kills, and Krista Lopez added 17 digs.
“I felt that Los Fresnos’ blocking really helped them, and our blocking was a little bit off,” Lady Chargers coach Lisa Mares said. “We seemed a little timid at the net. I just told the girls that against a team like Los Fresnos (in district), and (later) in the playoffs, every one of us has to be on, and some of the girls weren’t on tonight. I don’t know exactly what it was.
“I think once we get everybody on for a match like this one, we’ll do better,” Mares added. “There’s still another round of district, so we’ll see Los Fresnos again. We just have to work on the consistency of everybody being on for future matches.”
Brownsville Veterans next plays at Lopez at 3 p.m. Saturday to end the first round of district.