Jonathan Alder’s Corinne Parker has a view from the floor as teammate Hunter Kaltenbach (1) passes the ball Monday evening. Also pictured for JA is Ava Francis (8). The Lady Pioneers had little difficulty in sweeping Columbus Horizon Science during the opening round of the Division II tournament.
(Journal–Tribune photo by Tim Miller)
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There are many times when tournament pairings for high school sports leave teams facing a continuing uphill battle.
There are always teams that have struggled during the regular season who end up having to play top-rated squads during their first contest of the post-season.
Granted, it’s a way to weed out some of the weaker teams as the stronger ones advance up the ladder.
That was the case Monday evening when the third-seeded Lady Pioneers of Jonathan Alder cruised past No. 20 Columbus Horizon Science during the opening round of the Division II volleyball tournament.
It took Alder (19-4) only approximately 35 minutes to defeat the Hawks by scores of 25-3, 25-5, 25-3.
Players from Horizon Science simply could not withstand the pressure that was brought by Alder’s front line of Kortney Reynolds, Corinne Parker and Ava Francis.
However, while the Hawks had no one to challenge Alder’s front line, the outcome was based less on what the Poineers could do and more on what Horizon Science couldn’t.
The JA trio tallied only 21 kills between them (seven apiece). The Pioneers, however, didn’t need a great many kills to notch points.
A good number of JA’s 75 markers came from opposition mistakes, as the Hawks committed plenty of hitting, passing and serving errors.
The Lady Pioneers, who will host Cristo Rey of Columbus on Wednesday, set the tone for the match very early as they tallied the first 13 points of the opening game.
An Alder hitting miscue gave Horizon Science its first point.
The only marker that the Hawks really earned during the set came on an ace serve from Grace Nyamungusha.
A kill by Francis pushed Jonathan Alder out to a 15-3 lead.
From there, the Lady Pioneers finished with 10 unanswered points for the set victory.
The second set was much of the same as Alder’s points piled up on Hawk mistakes.
McKenzie Wright (who finished with 20 assists) set a kill for Reynolds that gave JA a 20-3 advantage.
Alder committed a net serve and sent a pass sailing out-of-bounds.
Those errors, however, did nothing to make anyone in Pioneer Nation fret.
Hunter Kaltenbach’s ace serve gave JA a 22-5 lead.
She finished the set with another ace that gave Alder a 2-0 lead.
Horizon Science scored the first point of the third game when the Pioneers were found guilty of a lift.
A kill by the Hawks later pulled the visitors to within 3-2, but that’s as close as it got the rest of the way.
JA rolled off the next 16 points, punctuated by a block from Reynolds.
The Hawks scored their final marker on another Alder lift violation.
Reynolds had a kill to give Alder a 22-3 lead.
Horizon Science committed three hitting or passing errors to end the match.