The first set was close with us trading points back and forth with WDC,” pointed out Barnesville Head Coach Megan Askegaard. “Both teams played great defense and came out attacking. We had a hard time passing the ball on the net at all times we battled back and forth with them, but in the end it came down to us making a couple errors are critical points in the match.” 

In set two Emily Condon took off with the serve and worked WDC serve receive into making errors to take an early 6-0 start before they were able to side out. “Our defense did a nice job moving our feet and working to score our points when their strong hitter was out of the game,” said Askegaard. “Our attack grew strong near the end of the set and we made some nice adjustments on our block which propelled us to the finish at the end of the set.” 

Set three saw the Wolverines take an early jump on the Trojans as Barnesville made some mistakes passing and attacking on the net. “We didn’t have the momentum that we should have coming off the previous win,” noted Askegaard. “We made too many errors and took away too many score opportunities from ourselves.”

After falling behind 4-0 in the fourth set, Elora Passa put down a nice kill to allow Barnesville to get on the board. “Our defense was still not adjusting to their big hitter in the middle that was scoring points on us,” commented Coach Askegaard. “We trailed until it was 14-19 and Claire Meyer and Elora scored on a block up on the net. Kya Anderson and Samantha Passa made some great plays in the backcourt while Emily and Claire worked to score points up on the net and get us the win. We made some strong hustle plays in the back court and used our big block up on the net to carry us into set 5.”

Kya Anderson opened up the final set with a tremendous serving run. From 4-2 until the Trojans made a hitting error on the net and Wadena-Deer Creek scored to end the run at 14-3. “Our block was huge in the last set and we came out firing kills on their side of the court,” added Askegaard. “Our defense was relentless and we knew we wanted to get the win against a team that ended our season last year.”

The Trojans were led by Elora Passa (24 kills, 15 set assists, 13/13 serving, 1 digs, 2 blocks), Emily Condon (4 kills, 15/17 serving, 25 digs), Samantha Passa (3 kills, 15/16 serving, 1 ace, 13 digs), Kya Anderson (23/23 serving, 29 digs), Claire Meyer (9 kills, 11/11 serving, 2 aces, 8 digs, 5 blocks) and Kimberly Maesse (23 set assists, 15 digs, 20/21 serving, 1 ace). 

Barnesville will host Sebeka on Tuesday night.