Cheney volleyball holds Great Northern League lead

Cheney High School volleyball continues to lead the Great Northern League standings, sitting at 2-0 in league play and 3-1 overall.

The team split its matches last week, winning a close one against East Valley and losing against Mt. Spokane.

“We knew it was going to be a really tough match,” head coach Brianne Lowe said about the Mt. Spokane match. “They’re a big school and they have a lot of talent, so we knew we had to come in and be aggressive.”

The first set of the match wasn’t as aggressive as hoped, and Cheney fell 25-14. A team meeting between sets helped to stop that momentum and turn things around, as Cheney rallied to take the second set 25-23.

“You can lose the first set by a lot of points, but if you recognize what you’re doing wrong and fix it, you can definitely see a change,” Lowe said.

Senior Morgan Davis led Cheney with 10 kills, and senior Kinsey Pease had 21 assists.

“That was one of (Davis’) best games of the year as far as kills for us,” Lowe said. “That was something we needed out of her.”

On the other side of the game, the defense was more even throughout the team.

“Defensively, we were kind of spread out and had quite a few girls contributing,” Lowe said. “Ideally you love everybody on the floor contributing.”

Playing against East Valley was just as tough, although Cheney came out on the winning end, at 3-2. The Blackhawks came out in a similar fashion as they did against Mt. Spokane, falling 25-19 to the Knights. But the score flipped in the second set, with Cheney winning 25-17. The next two sets were extremely close, with Cheney winning by a margin of three and two points, respectively. In the fifth set, Cheney was able to pull out the victory, 15-13.

“It definitely was a long, hard-fought battle,” Lowe said.

In the end, it came down to a few key moments for the Blackhawks, Lowe said.

“I think we took advantage at certain moments in the match better than we did against Mt. Spokane,” she said. “There were just a few times against Mt. Spokane where we just weren’t able to, and we did against EV, and it came out in our favor.”

Against East Valley, senior Ashley Seiler led the charge with 22 kills.

“She’s definitely one of our bigger offensive threats,” Lowe said. “So when she has a really good night, offensively, it helps out our program. But we need other kids to step up as well.”

The Blackhawks go on to play in Clarkston Thursday night, and travel to Pullman Tuesday, Oct. 1.

Results from Tuesday’s match against West Valley weren’t available at press time.

James Eik can be reached at james@cheneyfreepress.com.