DODGE CITY – The Hutchinson Community College volleyball team hit .292 and played a strong defensive game as the Lady Dragons swept Dodge City 3-0 on Wednesday night at Dodge City Community College.
The Lady Dragons (14-5 overall) defeated the Conquistadors 25-15, 25-16, 25-17 to complete the first half of the 2012 Jayhawk West season with a perfect 7-0 record.
Earlier in the day, the Lady Dragons found out they has dropped back out of the NJCAA Division I poll, but are still receiving votes. That news didn’t deter the Lady Dragons from rolling past Dodge City (8-15, 1-5) in 1 hour, 8 minutes.
Freshman Teresa Wade led Hutchinson with 13 kills and hitting .391. Wade posted her team-high seventh double-double of the season with 15 digs.
Sophomore Jade Nelson had eight kills and hit .353 for the match. Sophomore Gabby Rushton had six kills with a .500 hitting percentage.
Both sophomore setters Scout Heizer and Ashlyn Westerman had 17 assists each. Westerman had six digs and Heizer had four. Freshman libero Samantha Lackey had her 13th-straight match in double-figure digs with a match-high 16.
The Lady Dragons hit .292 on 44 kills with five team blocks and 47 team digs.
Dodge City was led by Chantal Birbaum’s nine kills. The Conquistadors had 23 kills and 11 attack errors with four blocks.
Hutchinson hit .371 in the opening set and raced out to a 9-3 lead. The Conquistadors pulled within 14-10 after a Mallory Ratts service ace, but HCC quickly took control of the set with a run of six-straight points, building a 20-11 lead after a Wade kill. Wade had six kills in the set and closed the set out with a tip just over the Dodge City block.
HCC hit .303 in the second set and had a 9-6 lead when Rushton put down a kill, combined with Shayne Haley for a stuff block and then Nelson slammed an attack home for a 12-6 lead. From that point, HCC steadily pulled away. Megan Heier’s kill on an over-dig capped off a 9-3 run to build a 17-8lead. A Heier ace built the lead to 21-10. Back-to-back Haley kills closed out the set and gave HCC a 2-0 match lead.
Wade and freshman Mariah Dickson had four kills each and Nelson added three as HCC dominated the final set, out-hitting Dodge City 15-4. The Lady Dragons hit a match-low .242 in the third set. Dodge City had its only leads of the match in the third set, with 8-5 its largest lead. HCC scored seven straight to overtake the Conquistadors. Leading 15-13, a Dickson kill and a Heizer service ace started a match-clinching 10-3 run, scoring the final three points of the match.
Wednesday’s match closed out a 13-match-in-17-day stretch for Hutchinson. They will have seven days off before playing next Wednesday at Colby to open the second half of the conference season.
MATCH NOTES – Teresa Wade has had five double-figure kill matches in a row. … Samantha Lackey has 17 double-figure digs matches out of 19 this season. … HCC hasn’t been 7-0 in the Jayhawk West since 2009. This was HCC’s 10th sweep of the season and sixth Jayhawk West sweep.
(HCC Sports Information)
