The Aledo Ladycats volleyball team took down Weatherford at the Lady Roos homecourt on Friday, Oct. 16.
The Ladycats won 3-0 against the Lady Roos in a match where career milestones were made for Aledo’s Kaelee Berkley and Weatherford’s Eloise Beauchamp.
Berkley recorded her 1,000th career kill, and Beauchamp recorded her 100th career block.
“I’m just so grateful to have it hit it in a good game with all of my teammates and coaches and yeah I’m just grateful,” Berkley said.
Beauchamp was equally as appreciative of her support group.
“I was so excited to get that milestone,” Beauchamp said. “I don’t want to be cocky, but blocking is my strongest thing I do. I was just happy to have my teammates there because they are so supportive and I wouldn’t be here without them.”
The first two sets saw Aledo jump out to early leads and pull away as the sets went on, leading to wins of 25-12 and 25-15. The third set saw Weatherford, playing its final home game of the season, start off by getting a 7-4 lead. The highlight was a three-point sequence with Beauchamp blocking two shots and scoring a kill to fire up the Lady Roos.
The Ladycats came back, winning the next five points to retake the lead 9-7, with three of of the points coming thanks to errors from Weatherford.
The Lady Roos cut Aledo’s lead to one point at 12-11 before the Ladycats reeled off four straight points with Berkley hitting two kills, Kennedy Christie hitting one kill and Karsyn Evans hitting an ace to extend Aledo’s lead to 16-11.
Later with the Ladycats up 18-12, Weatherford came back. Following a service error from Aledo, the Ladycats committed back-to-back hitting errors before Laine Tomlinson hit an ace to cut the lead to 18-16.
Following a Lady Roo error that led to a point, Weatherford’s Ava Broadie hit a kill and Aledo committed another hitting error as the Lady Roos cut the lead to one point, 19-18.
The Ladycats won three of the next four points with two kills from Avery Pipkins and one kill from Lily Morris to extend the lead to 22-19. Again Weatherford clawed back, with a hitting error from Aledo and a kill from Tomlinson closing the lead back down to one point, 22-21.
The teams exchanged points from there, and the Ladycats had match point up 24-23. Berkley put down a kill to end the match, winning the set 25-23, but there was an argument from Weatherford’s side the play should not have been allowed.
“Their setter was backrow and they passed a tight ball that went over the net,” Weatherford coach Courtney Hammett said. “Their setter went up to try and save it but it was already on our side and she touched it above the net. My blocker went up and touched it which is a backrow attack on their backrow setter, but the referee didn’t call it as a backrow attack.”
Aledo was led by Berkley who had 15 kills, and Pipkins was second with 12. Harper Harbuck directed the offense with 26 assists.
Defensively, libero Evans led the team with 30 digs, and Leighton Lindley had three of her team’s 10 blocks.
Ladycat coach Claire Gay thought her team played great in the first two sets before having to gut things out in a third set.
“I think we lost momentum in the third set,” Gay said. “Just a lot of choppy points on both sides of the net. They were missing a lot of serves and we just could not get into a groove. They started blocking us really well. We weren’t distributing the ball where we needed to in terms of setting goes. Those are really good things to see at this point in the season because it helps us improve in the gym at practice.”
For Weatherford, Tomlinson led the team with eight kills, and Broadie was second with five. Natalie Griffin had a team-high 12 assists and two aces.
Defensively, Beauchamp had four blocks while libero Hayden Faught had 10 digs.
Hammett thought her team came into the match with the wrong mindset which affected their play in the first two sets.
“Obviously they are really talented and are a great team with a great coach, but Set 1 and 2 my girls just played scared and hesitant,” Hammett said. “They were on their heels all night and were not responding to big plays. A big side of that when Weatherford and Aledo play is the mental side of it, and it affected my girls, especially my younger ones. It was just a lot of hesitation rather than aggression, rather than taking initiative to make the first play. It was mental.”
Aledo improves to 32-7 on the season and 12-0 in district. Weatherford’s record goes to 25-14 and 9-3 in district. Both teams will play in the bi-district round of the playoffs on Thursday-Friday, Oct. 29-30. The Community News will update playoff information at a later date.
— Jordan Neal
The Weatherford Lady Roos had an up and down match at Arlington Bowie on Tuesday, Oct. 20, winning 3-1.
Weatherford won the first set easily 25-13, but then lost a real close Set 2, 25-23. With the match tied at 1, the Lady Roos rallied to win the last two sets 25-9 and 25-18.
Despite the win, Lady Roo coach Courtney Hammett has higher expectations for how her girls can play.
“We are better than that,” Hammett said. “The saying, ‘a win is a win,’ does not apply here because we did not get better last night.”
Weatherford’s last regular season match is at 5:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 23, at Arlington High School.
— Jordan Neal
The Aledo Ladycats swept the Arlington Sam Houston Lady Texans for the second time this season, winning on the road Tuesday, Oct. 20, with scores of 25-11, 25-6, 25-12.
Aledo improved to 33-7 overall and 13-0 in district play. The Ladycats’ streak of not losing a district set also continued. They are now 39-0 through 13 district matches.
Middle-blocker Leighton Lindley led the team with 11 kills. Outside-hitter Kaelee Berkley, who accomplished her 1,000th career kill Oct. 16 in Aledo’s win over Weatherford, finished second in kills with nine. Libero Karsyn Evans led the team in aces with three and tied for the team lead in digs with Berkley, finishing with 11. As a team, Aledo combined for five blocks.
Aledo’s final match of the regular season will be against Arlington Lamar on Friday, Oct. 23, at home. The last time both teams faced each other was on Sept. 29. In that game, Aledo won in a sweep.
— Brock Burgan
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