Waubonsie stays alive in Upstate Eight race

Waubonsie Valley coach Kristen Stuart did not care much for her team's serving in Game 1 on Thursday. Game 2 was another story.

The Warriors missed too many serves in the opener at Lake Park but still managed to prevail 25-14. Stuart let her players know about the miscues, and things were different in Game 2.

Then it was the Lancers (7-15, 2-6) who started making mistakes in the serving game, as Waubonsie kept alive hopes of an Upstate Eight Conference title by taking the second game 25-12, thanks in large part to some nasty serves.

"In the first game we missed a lot of serves, but then we corrected that," Stuart said. "It was much better. We had a few words with them after that first game."

Not only was it tough serving that gave the Lancers fits, but the return of outside hitter Joslyn Drew to the Warriors' lineup gave the visitors more firepower than Lake Park could handle on this night.

"We played really well and had it all together tonight," said Drew, who had a team-leading 11 kills in her return from a knee injury. "I was excited (to get back), but as a team we were really excited too. We want to win conference this year so we had to win."

Waubonsie Valley, now 16-5 overall and 7-1 in the UEC, jumped ahead in the opener 14-6 despite four service errors. With setter Kassie Kadera running a smooth offense, the Warriors had more than enough to take Game 1, 25-14. Alana Jones added a pair of kills and Katrina Boryc's defense helped do in the Lancers.

In Game 2 Taylor Gillhouse and Boryc regularly handcuffed Lake Park with tough serves, and Gillhouse closed the match with 5 aces.

"We were just off today with our serve receive," Lake Park coach Kate Clifton said. "You don't serve receive, you can't pass and you can't set."

Lake Park took a quick 4-0 lead in Game 2 behind a kill and an ace from Ashley Kolar. But Boryc erased that deficit with 5 quick points, two of which came on aces. The Warriors took off from there and went ahead 13-6 following a Jones kill and an ace by Gillhouse.

The final point of the match looked like many others on the night when Kadera set up Drew for the clincher.

"That was a pleasant surprise," Stuart said of Drew's strong outing after missing the team's last two conference matches. "But we have a balanced attack and Kassie does a nice job of moving the ball around."