Published: September 24, 2008 10:34 am      

Lady Jaguars reach semifinals of Rockcastle Co. Invitational

MT. VERNON—A nice run all the way to the semifinals of the Rockcastle Co. Invitational over the weekend might have put the North Laurel volleyball team back on track.

“We had hit a bit of a mid-season lull,” Lady Jaguar coach Bill Abner said. “But we seemed to really shake it off this weekend in what was an unbelievably even-matched, competitive tournament.”

North notched three wins to improve their season record to 16-11, equaling their victory total from a year ago with three weeks still left in the regular season.

“We have an outside shot to match the school record of 21 wins by the ‘03 team,” Abner said. “But more important for us right now is to continue to ride some momentum to the postseason.”

North opened pool play with a 21-19, 21-12 win over rival Clay Co. “One of our biggest wins of the season, because they are really good and had beat us in the finals of our tournament the week before,” Abner pointed out.

Pool losses to Wayne Co. and Boyle Co. threatened to ruin the weekend, but North rebounded when the single elimination tournament began.

“We beat Whitley Co. in a very tense match in three sets (25-19, 20-25, 15-13), then immediately turned around and had to play a well-rested McCreary Co. team that we had lost to earlier in the year.”

And in that match, the Lady Jags were on the ropes, down 23-18 in the first set before roaring back to win 26-24. The second set was nearly a carbon copy, as they put the last seven points of the match away to finish things off 25-22.

“Time isn’t a factor in volleyball, you are just playing to a set point total,” Abner pointed out. “So when your opponent is that close to closing it out, it’s easy to tense up and not play with any fearlessness on your shots. But we didn’t do that at all in this match. Another very good win.”

That moved the Lady Jags into the semifinals against Pulaski Co.

“Here’s how balanced this tournament was,” Abner said. “Three of the four semifinal teams (Clay and Rock were the others) had combined to go 2-7 in pool play. But we were the last four standing of a 12-team tournament.”

It looked like North was on it’s way to a final date with Rockcastle, as they won a tough first set 26-24. “But it got away from us just a little after that, and Pulaski is much improved from earlier in the year.”

The Lady Maroons won the second set 25-18, and appeared to have the third wrapped up at 14-7 (going to 15 in the third sets). But North won a point, and turned the serving over to Brittney Smith, who promptly helped the Lady Jags to six straight points and a 14-all tie.

“Just a great job by her,” Abner said. “One serve into the net, or long, and the match is over. But not only was she getting them in, she was putting something on them.”

Alas, Pulaski finally managed to win a point on Smith's serve, then closed the match out with a kill at the net.

Still, Abner wasn’t disappointed. “Not at all. It was unreal how we competed all weekend. Makenzie (Prichard) had probably the best weekend of her career (34 kills in six games, and 20 service aces). And our setters were doing a great job of getting it to her in the right spots.”

North hosted Somerset in an important district game Tuesday, and will travel to Russell Co. on Thursday.