Daily Newsletters
Account
Washington Evening Journal
111 North Marion Avenue
Washington, IA 52353
319-653-2191
Panther volleyball drops season opener to Grayhounds
Mt. Pleasant swept by Burlington to open 2023-24 season
BURLINGTON — Mt. Pleasant volleyball kicked off its season on Monday night with a road trip against the Grayhounds of Burlington.
It was a tough first night of action for the Panthers as they trailed through all three sets, en route to a Grayhound 25-7, 25-14, 25-16 victory.
Serve and serve receive was where the Panthers struggled throughout the SEC clash.
Meanwhile the Grayhounds used some efficient serving to build up leads of which the Panthers couldn’t make up.
Burlington rattled off 21 aces through the three sets of action.
“Serving and serve receive,” Mt. Pleasant first time head coach Logan Wall said. “I was pretty confident with our serve receive coming in. They had some tough servers and we couldn't quite handle some of them. We'll be ready for them next time.”
“I think we have to go harder in practice,” Wall said. “We haven't had a lot of time to work on some different game situations. We're really going to focus on some different things in the game. We have to work on our rotation, trying to find that cohesiveness between our setter and our hitters. We have to serve tougher in practice to our back row.”
Things didn’t start great for the Panthers in set one as a pair of crossing violations gave the Grayhounds a 2-0 advantage and they would never lose it. A kill by junior Zoey Atkinson brought it back to one at 2-1, but Burlington started the serving onslaught.
Burlington’s Sydney Schroeder delivered four straight aces to give the Grayhounds what would turn into an eventual 9-1 advantage.
A pair of kills from freshman Addison Clark made it 9-3, but that is as close as the Panthers would come in the opening set as Burlington tallied nine aces through the opening match.
The start to set two was similar to the first. After an early tie at 1-1, Burlington scored six straight points to make it 7-1.
Burlington led as much as 10-3 in the second sequence, but Mt. Pleasant showed grit.
The Panthers battled back.
Mt. Pleasant cut the Burlington lead to one at 13-12 after scoring six points off the serves of Addison Peck. Peck would led the Panthers with two aces on the night.
However, the Grayhounds pulled away once again with six straight points. The Panthers scored just two points the rest of the set.
Mt. Pleasant got better as the night went on, but just couldn’t find the lead.
The Panthers tied the final match three times and had it at 16-15 after coming back from a five-point deficit, but another big service run all but sealed it.
Wall said she know this team has the potential to do great things.
“They have the potential to be great,” Wall said. “Cohesiveness is a really big thing and we just haven't found that yet. They’re a tough group and they’ve had a lot of challenges in their career and have come back from being behind. They’re use to coming back.”
Mt. Pleasant will look to get on track in Ottumwa on Thursday, Aug. 24 in a triangular.
