Update 10/28/21: On Wednesday, October 27, Garretson School District announced a date change for the first play-off game to Nov 1 at 7:00 p.m. The article has been changed to reflect this.
Last Tuesday, October 19, it was blue vs blue as the Garretson Blue Dragons volleyball team faced off against West Central.
The Lady Dragons came out of the gate screaming. As their final home game of the season, it was also Senior Night, and Coach Dennis Northrup started his six seniors. They took the opportunity to show the rapport and experience built over the past several years. Their blue-suited opponents cowered, allowing the powerhouse team to take the first set 25-9.
During the second set, West Central made an effort to rally, but the Dragons shut them down and again took the set 25-15.
During the third set, an inability to return the attacks set by Garretson made it difficult for the Trojans to gather points, but they were still able to take the Dragons by surprise and show that slow and steady could win the race. They pulled out 19 points before Garretson took the game-winning point.
Aliyah Leedy had 3 aces, Jaelyn Benson and Alli Gawarecki had 2, and Sam Shellum had one. Logan Bly led with kills, tacking 11 more onto her scoreboard, while Lily Ranschau had 8, A. Gawarecki had 6, and Kaylin Koch had 5. Anna Jones, Ranschau, and Bly had 3 block assists each, and Benson accumulated 27 assists. Benson also had 8 digs, Lexi Gawarecki had 7, and Leedy and Ranschau each tabulated 6.
The team then traveled to Colman-Egan (21-7), where they again took down the opposing team in three sets, 25-15, 25-8, and 25-17.
The Lady Dragons nabbed 65 digs, with Benson leading the pack with 17. Ranschau and L. Gawarecki had 11 digs each. Jones, Ranschau, and Bly each had solo blocks, and the team tallied 37 kills. Ranschau led on those with 10, Koch had 9, and Jones and Bly gathered 6 each.
They then headed to Volga to take on the Sioux Valley Cossacks (14-16) for their final regular game of the season, where the three sets were each identical score-wise: 25-14, in favor of Garretson.
L. Gawarecki led the way with 13 digs, while Benson had 9 and Ranschau, 8. Benson added another 28 assists to her tally, and Bly added 9 more kills and 4 block assists to her score. Koch had 8 kills, Ranschau 7, and Benson 5. Ranschau gathered 3 aces while Leedy and L. Gawarecki sunk 2 and Koch landed 1 in the other court. A. Gawarecki had 3 block assists and Jones had 2.
On Monday, November 1, the Lady Blue Dragons will be hosting the first bracket of the Region 3A tourney against the seventh seeded conference player, currently West Central. The winner of that game will head to Harrisburg on Thursday, November 4.
"Our focus is one game at a time," said assistant coach Kelsey Buchholz. "We are confident in our skills, talent, and teamwork but at this point in the season, everyone is 0-0 and anything can happen. We need to take care of business one game, one set, and one point at a time."
In related news, Head Coach Dennis Northrup was named one of the coach finalists of the year by Adrenaline Volleyball, an honor that is well-deserved. The volleyball program at Garretson has come a long way in the past several years since he took the reins.
