Warrior spikers down Kenai

Sept. 10, 2006

By Jeremiah Bartz/ Frontiersman

WASILLA - When the Kenai Kardinals volleyball squad had success against the Wasilla Warriors Saturday, it wasn't because of overwhelming power. Kenai was just using the soft, and possibly annoying, tips over the net.

But once the Warriors were able defend that little strategy, Wasilla cruised to a 3-1 (25-13, 25-23, 19-25, 29-27) win over the Kards at WHS.

&#8220We finally started digging the tip,” Wasilla head coach Marge Johnson said.

Wasilla built a comfortable two-game lead in the match before Kenai started to have great success with their tip drill. In the third game Kenai broke an 8-8 tie with a 7-3 run, gaining most of their points off of the tips. Kenai's tall set of middle hitters would dump the ball right between Wasilla's front and middle rows.

The Kardinals, who edged 3A Houston 3-2 on Friday, nearly forced a fifth game in the match. Junior Kenai took a 24-22 lead in the fourth game, but sophomore Jenna Johnson and junior Ashlen Welch recorded consecutive kills to tie the game.

Welch, who had six kills in the game, posted the final two kills of the contest to give the Warriors the victory. Welch took the ball of a Stephanie Blair set and put the ball into Kenai's back row to give the Warriors the 28-27 lead. On the final play, Welch got the ball off a Blair bump, and put the ball right between a pair of Kardinal players.

Johnson led the squad with seven kills.

Wasilla improved to 2-2 in Northern Lights Conference play with the win over Kenai and a 3-0 victory over Soldotna on Friday.

Last week, Wasilla suffered a pair of NLC road loses, losing to Skyview and Homer on the Kenai Peninsula.

Kodiak sweeps Colony

The Colony Knights suffered a pair of losses at Kodiak over the weekend.

On Friday the Knights suffered a 3-2 (25-21, 20-25, 25-15, 25-20, 15-7) to the Bears.

Colony took an 11-0 lead behind the serving of Kara Larson in the second game. Larson's serving helped the Knights tie the match at 1-1 in the second game.

Hannah Curtis led the Knights with 19 kills in the contest. Katie Enloe posted 16 digs.

On Saturday, Kodiak defeated Colony 3-1 (25-22, 25-21, 23-25, 25-22).

Kodiak improved to 6-0 overall and 4-0 in conference play. Colony is now 1-3 overall and 0-2 in conference.

Contact Frontiersman sports editor Jeremiah Bartz at sports@frontiersman.com.