Volleyball News — Page 2

Red Demons Volleyball struggles ahead of Sub-State

October 19, 2017 By DCHS Sports

By Shelton Burch, Courtesy of Dodge Globe Sports Editor

The Dodge City Red Demons fell in straight sets to both opponents Tuesday in the team’s final triangular of the season.

The event took place in Great Bend, Kansas. The team lost to Great Bend by scores 18-25 and 10-25. They also lost to Hoisington 20-25 and 16-25.

The pair of loses moved the Red Demons to 8-26 overall ahead of Saturday’s Sub-State tournament.

“I think the girls are a little disappointed,” Red Demons head coach Amy Fleener said. “We just were flat. We didn’t take any energy with us.”

Against Great Bend, the Red Demons fell behind multiple points early but were able to dig in and made a match that looked like it would become a blowout into a fairly-competitive match Fleener said.

“A coach always thinks that they’re games that

you should win, and I certainly think that about Hoisington and Great Bend,” Fleener said. “Both are matches we should have won, we just (are) not putting all the pieces together.”

The team, however, has been inconsistent this season. At times, they have played well, but never for an entire match, something Fleener said she’s been trying to figure out though constant study of film and data.

“Every match we’ve got three or four girls that are performing at a pretty high level, and then we have a couple that aren’t, but it’s not the same combination every match,” Fleener said. “I not quite sure how I get all six of them going on all cylinders all the time.”

The team has even shown glimpses in some sets where they’ve reached what Fleener believes is their full potential. It’s just a question of if it’ll be this season or next year.

“I know all of the pieces are bound to come together at some time, I hope it’s this year and not next year,” Fleener said.

As the team prepares for Sub-State, Fleener

said she sees the team most likely as facing Hutchinson, then Garden City based on how seedings are working out right now. The first match will be more than winnable.

“I expect us to beat Hutch, we played them at the beginning of the year in the preseason tournament, I’ve kind of followed them throughout the year,” Fleener said. “You know a coach always expects to win and with Hutch I fully expect to be able to beat them.”

Garden City, if Dodge City has to play them, could be a more challenging story. Garden City beat Dodge City twice this season, both by straight sets.

“We’re gonna need to play our very best to beat them,” Fleener said. “But at the very least I want us to compete with them.”

The Red Demons head to Wichita Northwest High School Saturday to play the Sub-State tournament. The action is scheduled to start at 2 p.m.

Red Demons go 0-2 in final home triangular of season

October 3, 2017 By DCHS Sports

Red Demons go 0-2 in final home triangular of season

By: Shelton Burch

Courtesy of Dodge Globe Staff Writer

The Dodge City Red Demons volleyball team fell both to the Liberal Redskins and the Garden City Lady Buffaloes Tuesday night.

It was the last time the Red Demons will play at home in the 2017 regular season.

The night started off with a match between the Red Demons and the Liberal High School Redskins. The match appeared to start promisingly for the Red Demons. After trailing 1-0 in the first set, the Red Demons tied it at 1-1. They they took the lead at 2-1 and made it 3-1. Consecutive points by the Redskins tied the set at 3-3, but the Red Demons ran away with the lead after taking it back at 4-3. They went on to win the first set 25-18.

Set two was nearly the exact opposite. Liberal again took a 1-0 lead, and Dodge City again tied it at 1-1. This time, however, Liberal charged ahead, scoring the next five points to go up 6-1. Liberal ran away with set two, winning 25-12.

The last set was the closest. There were six lead-changes, and the score was tied more times than in first two sets combined. As the scores mounted, the teams battled. Typical volleyball sets end when a team scores 25 points, however rules require the victor to win by two. Liberal eventually won, winning the set in extra points, 27-25.

Liberal won the match in three sets by scores 18-25, 25-12, 27-25.

“(It was) just heartbreaking for them really,” Red Demons head coach Amy Fleener said. “To be so close and really to have played pretty well. In the first set and the third set of that match we played pretty well. (We) strung together a sequence of volleys, chased down some balls that we don’t typically chase down.”

Next up for the Red Demons was a match against the Garden City Lady Buffaloes.

That match was clearly tougher, as the Buffaloes jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first set and a 3-0 lead in the second one before the Red Demons got a point. The Buffaloes never trailed in either set, and never led in set two by any less than two points. Only once in either set did the Red Demons narrow the lead to just one point, when they made the score 3-2 in set one.

The Buffaloes won the match in straight sets, winning 25-15, 25-15.

“Garden City’s the fastest offense that we’ve played all year, and it showed,” Fleener said. “It took us a while to read the ball, to get up on the

block. But (blocking) has consistently been our strength.”

Fleener said the team continues to struggle with consistency and confidence.

“(When) we think the game’s going south, we let it go south,” Fleener said. “When we don’t think we can compete, we don’t.”

Fleener said the team is talented and athletic, but is missing something.

“(They’re) a group of great girls, athletic girls, I love coaching them; there’s just not one of them that steps up and says ‘Game’s on the line, I’m gonna make a play for you,’” Fleener said. “They’re still just hedging their bets and looking for somebody else to do that.”

While she would have attributed that as possibly being due to having a young team, Fleener said she can’t anymore because the team’s starting rotation includes a senior, four juniors and a sophomore in the starting six.

“We’re not so young anymore,” Fleener said.

The losses came at a particularly-precarious time for the Red Demons, whose schedule going forward affords them no easier matches. The next two events, which include another Tri and the Western Athletic Conference event, are both hosted by the very schools that beat Dodge City Tuesday night.

The Red Demons head to Garden City, Kansas on Oct. 5, and then to Liberal, Kansas Oct. 14.

An emotional night

It was also an emotional night for one of the Red Demons players: Senior Jessica Olivarez.

Just before her team played Garden City Tuesday night, Olivarez was recognized by Dodge City High School and thanked for her contributions to the program.

As one of two seniors on the roster, Tuesday night was Olivarez’s last night playing at home for the Dodge City High School volleyball team. The team’s other senior, Brianna Buller, was absent Tuesday night due to illness.

“I’m very, very pleased with her,” Fleener said. “She had a great summer, her attitude’s been good, her leadership as far as what she’s telling the girls and talking to the girls; you can tell this season’s very important to her. She’s played well this year, she’s played very well, and I thought she played well tonight.”

Olivarez said her last home matches were very intense, but made great because of the girls around her.

“I love the girls I play with and I’m just glad I got to play with them my last games,” Olivarez said. “They make it very enjoyable and just so

much fun.”

With two tri’s, the WAC event, and possibly Sub-State and State tournaments looming, Olivarez said she just hopes the team can play to its potential and maybe win a few more games.

“We’ve definitely have gotten a lot better than we were last-year, and I’m just very proud of them,” Olivarez said.

Olivarez said she hopes to attend Wichita State after she graduates. She isn’t sure if she’ll play volleyball when she gets there.

The Red Demons will continue their season Oct. 5 with a Triangular in Garden City, Kansas.

Red Demon volleyball works to rebound after rough week

September 26, 2017 By DCHS Sports

Red Demon volleyball works to rebound after rough week

By: Shelton Burch

Courtesy of Dodge Globe Staff Writer

The Dodge City Red Demons volleyball had a rough week last week, head coach Amy Fleener said. The team lost to Ulysses at Ulysses High School in a Dual last Monday, then went1-3 in a tournament there Saturday.

It wasn’t a week that went as well as Fleener said she would have hoped.

“We’re just struggling to make plays for the team,” Fleener said. “We’re still a little bit self-focused and making plays for ourselves and not going the extra step and making plays for the team.”

It’s been a long process this year for the team, which after last week is now 7-17 overall.

The two trips to Ulysses were the end of a three-event road trip for the Red Demons. Despite the record, Fleener said the team was still playing good volleyball, they just haven’t figured out how to provide for themselves what their home fans provide them. “The energy that we got playing at home was good for our girls and they fed off of that and they were able to go ahead and push through it and win a few matches in a row,” Fleener said. “We have not done a very good job on the road creating that energy for ourselves.”

As fun as it is to play at home and in front of fans cheering you on, Fleener said the team has to learn how to create that energy for themselves. To help, the coaches have started adding intensity to some of the drills the team does.

In the meantime, the Red Demons now begin the back half of their schedule. It won’t be easy, with State and Sub-State lurking at the end of October, just beyond Tri’s at Great Bend and Garden City, which are only interrupted by the Western Athletic Conference event at Liberal.

First though, the Red Demons return home, where they will host a Tri at the Dodge City High School Field House at 4 p.m. tonight.

Red Demons volleyball team opens conference play with win

September 15, 2017 By DCHS Sports

Red Demons volleyball team opens conference play with win

By: Shelton Burch

Courtesy of Dodge City Daily Globe

The Dodge City Red Demons volleyball team opened Western Athletic Conference play with a win Thursday night, defeating the Liberal Redskins 25-15, 20-25, 25-20, 16-25, 15-13.

It was the team’s longest match of the season, their first dual of the season and their last home match until the team hosts a Triangular on Sept. 26.

The match was back and- forth the entire night, sometimes within sets later won handily by one team or the other. In set one, the Red Demons jumped out to a 5-2 lead and expanded it all the way to 9-3. The Redskins fought back though, narrowing the margin to as close as 12-11. The Red Demons

eventually won set one 25-15.

In set two, Liberal and Dodge City exchanged the lead three times in the first six points before Liberal won three straight points after being tied 3-3 to go up 6-3. When the Demons made it 6-4, the Redskins again went on a run, this time an even longer one, winning five straight points to go up 11-5. They eventually won that set 25-20.

That kind of energy was something Red Demons head coach Amy Fleener had to try to manage. Fleener said afterward she’d like to manage the team’s energy better.

“We started the match with a lot of energy and really focused and we were moving pretty well, and we just kind of rode the roller coaster curve for five sets,” Fleener said. “So I would like to maybe do better.”

After falling in set two and the standard break between sets, the Red Demons pounced in set three, taking a quick 8-0 lead. The Red Demons never led by less than four points in set three Thursday night.

Fleener said she tried to encourage the girls during that break between set two and three.

“I told them to sing a new song in their head,” Fleener said. “I said ‘Whatever song has gotten you doubting your ability to do this,’ I said ‘Let’s blow that one out and find a new one.”

Fleener said managing that energy through all of that and the final two sets was the most challenging part.

“Keeping them climbing the ladder up, it’s been the most difficult part,” Fleener said. “And a lot of that’s due to our youth. Stretches of (the match) obviously were very good,

stretches of it were frustrating.”

Still, Fleener said the team’s win Thursday night was a step in the right direction.

“The most gratifying thing was that we didn’t let the win slip away,” Fleener said.“We should have beat them from the get-go, and we knew that talent wise, and for (the Red Demons players) to hang on and win, that would have never happened last year.”

The Red Demons head to Liberal for a multi-team tournament on Saturday, then play a Dual and a Tournament in Ulysses before returning to action in Dodge City, Kansas on Sept. 26

Red Demon Volleyball host Home Quad

September 6, 2017 By DCHS Sports

Red Demons go 1-2 in Dodge City Quad

By: Shelton Burch

Courtesy of the Dodge City Daily Globe

The Dodge City Red Demons volleyball team lost in straight sets against the Great Bend Panthers, 25-11, 25-12 to close out the Dodge City High School JV/V Volleyball Quad Tuesday night.

Overall, the Demons finished the Quad with a 1-2 record, falling also to Kiowa County in three sets before the eventual loss to Great Bend.

It was an ending Dodge City head coach Amanda Fleener said she was not happy with.

“We just laid an egg,” Fleener said. “We reverted back to last year’s behavior, mentally more than physically.”

She described that behavior as “apathetic.”

“My upperclassmen I usedto losing, and we just reverted,” Fleener said. “We’ll fix it.”

Set one against Great Bend was back and forth. Slowly though, Great Bend pulled away, making the score 10-6, then eventually 17-10, then 21-11 before finally ending the first set 25-11.

The Panthers actually trailed the Red Demons 1-0 in set two, but soon rallied, making the score 3-1 before eventually seizing absolute control of the set by expanding

their lead to 12-3. The Red Demons got as close as 12-6, but never made it any more competitive, falling behind 14-6, 15-10 18-10 and eventually 21-12 at various points before eventually falling 25-12.

Despite the loss, and the initial loss to Kiowa, the Red Demons had their shining moments. They beat Spearville in straight sets, 25-16, 25-23 to get their lone win of the day.

Coach Fleener said despite the mental hurdles, there is a chance this Red Demons volleyball team can be extremely good.

“We have unlimited physical potential,” Fleener said. “We can do things that our opponents can’t do at the net. Blocking, some hitting schemes, we just need to find some confidence to put more than two or three points together.”

The team, however, is also young, with just two seniors on a team of 13 players, which was no more than half the seniors listed on any of the other three teams to play in the Quad. Kiowa County had four listed, Spearville had six and Great Bend also had six.

Overall, five of Fleener’s 13 players are either freshman or sophomores, and Tuesday night, that played a part, Fleener said.

“My freshman were timid tonight,” Fleener said. “They both did a couple of really good things throughout the night but overall they’re playing

a little timid so I need to bring them along faster.”

The Red Demons play their next event, another Quad, at Dodge City High School starting at 4 p.m. on Thursday. That event is scheduled to include Hays, Lakin and Sublette high schools.