By Tom Waddill
Sports Editor
HUNTSVILLE —
The Lady Hornets’ 2010 debut — and their new head coach’s first match in Huntsville — was a swinging success.
Playing Lufkin in a nondistrict volleyball match at the Paul Bohan Hornet Gym, Huntsville took charge early Tuesday, played well throughout the match and thoroughly dominated in a 25-10, 25-12 and 25-10 victory.
From the beginning, the Lady Hornets looked polished and sharp in their first match under the direction of coach Stephanie Branch. Serving, passing, blocking, and most importantly, hitting — Branch’s excitable bunch put on an hour-long clinic and had the Lady Panthers taking notes.
“This is a great way to start the season,” senior setter Leslie Hoke said. “We came out and everybody knew what to do. Everybody played their roles and everybody contributed.
“I knew we had a great team, but really I’m surprised,” Hoke added. “I didn’t anticipate how well everybody would mesh together.”
Mesh together? The Lady Hornets looked like a fine-tuned machine Tuesday night. Every combination of players Branch put on the floor worked well and moved the match closer to its conclusion.
Junior Karly Sanders led the Lady Hornets with eight kills. Senior Kaylynne Wright added seven spikes and junior Brittani Rollins contributed four kills. Wright and Rollins got a lot of offensive help from junior Breanna Fuller, sophomore Briana McCall and freshman Jordyn Vaughn, who combined for five more kills.
Hoke led the way behind the service line, booming five aces at the Lady Panthers. She also passed out seven assists while splitting time at setter with freshman Lindsey Mizell. Mizell also had seven assists.
Defensively, Fuller, Sanders and McCall all had a solo block.
Branch was ecstatic after Tuesday’s match. An admitted perfectionist, the young coach said she saw a few things the Lady Hornets will address in practice today. She wants her team to move its initial passes around instead of bumping the ball to the setter in the center of the court.
Other than that, she was pleased by her team’s play.
“We did well all the way around,” said Branch, who came to Huntsville after serving as an assistant volleyball coach at Magnolia West. “Serving, we did a lot better today than we did in our scrimmages. We also did not get one net call all night. In our scrimmages last Friday we were in the net a lot — a whole lot. That’s one thing I’m extremely happy about.
“The only thing that really concerns me is our intensity. Sometimes our intensity level would not be where it needs to be. When the tempo slowed, we kind of slowed down too. We can’t do that.
“I tell the girls we don’t want to be average, we want to be great. We played average at times tonight.”
If the Lady Hornets played average at times, those times did not last long.
Huntsville, which is looking to return to the Class 4A state playoffs after missing the postseason last year, roared out to a 14-5 lead in the first game Tuesday and never was threatened.
Lufkin tried to hang tough in the second contest, but Huntsville pulled away with a 10-1 run that started with one of Rollins’ huge hits from the left side and ended with a convincing spike from Wright’s powerful right arm.
Huntsville went on a similar spurt in the third game, pulling away and putting an end to the match with an impressive 13-1 run. This time, Wright started the rally and Hoke ended it with a pair of aces.
“I’m so pleased with tonight’s performance,” Branch said. “I asked the girls before the match to come out and play well, have a good time and win. They did all three. What a great way to start the season.”
The Lady Hornets practice today, then head to the Houston area Thursday for the start of a two-day tournament hosted by Cy-Fair High School. The tournament runs Thursday and Saturday. Huntsville also plays at Klein Collins on Friday at 5:30 p.m.
