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HARTINGTON - The Hartington-Newcastle Lady Wildcat volleyball team hosted its own invitational Oct. 11 and finished the day on a high note defeating Wausa in HNS’s final match of the tournament.
Entering the Wausa match, Hartington-Newcastle had dropped its first two matches in the tournament and were on a 10-game skid including a loss to Wausa back on Sept. 30 in a match played on the Lady Vikings home court.
In the match played in Hartington, the Lady Wildcats dropped the opening set 25-23 before heating things up and responding for the come-frombehind win by scores of 25-16 and 25-17 in the “mini” reverse sweep.
Vayda did the most offensive damage slamming down nine winners in the match, Karissa Bruning hit six, Ella Eickhoff three and Justyce Sohl had a couple.
Lainey Morten tipped up 21 set assists and Sohl and Nora Lange had a pair of ace serves apiece.
Bruning was a menace at the net recording six blocks and also posted five digs.
Sohl had six digs while Lippert and Eickhoff matched Bruning with five each.
Tri County Northeast beat HNS in straight sets 25-17 and 25-18.
Bruning had five winners against the Wolfpack with Lippert and Lange adding three each.
Morten had 10 assists. Lippert made 14 good passes off of the Tri County serve, Lange had nine and Katelyn Wubben recorded seven along with Sohl.
Complete statistics were not available for the match with Madison except the most important one, the Lady Dragons defeated the Lady Wildcats 25-21 and 25-19.
In a match played in Hartington Oct. 7, the Lady Wildcats struggled against LCC and fell in straight sets 25-11, 25-9 and 25-8.
The Lady Bears showed up with a lofty record and ranking in Class C2 and made a believer out of HNS.
Lippert did have a pretty good night, especially in the back row where she posted a dozen digs and 21 successful passes in serve receive while hammering three winners, but it certainly wasn’t enough to keep pace with the Lady Bears on that night.
Sohl, Morten and Hadley Grutsch each had seven digs in the match but the Lady ‘Cats also made 51 errors as a team in attempting to dig the LCC attack. Hartington-Newcastle was set to take on Tri County again Oct. 14 on the road in a triangular along with Winside.
The Greater Northeast Activities Conference Tourney starts Oct. 18 with the Lady ‘Cats taking on LCC in the first round.
Hartington-Newcastle 23 25 25 Wausa 25 16 17 k=Kills, a=Ace Serves, b=Blocks, d=Digs, s=Set Assists, r=Serve Receiving.
HARTINGTON-NEWCASTLE: Justyce Sohl 2k, 2a, 2b, 6d, 7r; Lainey Morten 1b, 21s; Vayda Lippert 9k, 1a, 5d, 8r; Ella Eickhoff 3k, 1a, 2b, 5d, 1r; Nora Lange 1k, 2a, 2b, 4d, 9r; Katelyn Wubben 3d, 7r; Karissa Bruning 6k, 6b, 5d, 3r; Hadley Grutsch 4d, 4r. Tri County Northeast 25 25 Hartington-Newcastle 17 18
