The Emporia High volleyball team got in one last tune up Tuesday night before heading into Sub- State play, compiling a 2-1 record at the Lawrence High Invitational.
The Lady Spartans got victories over Lawrence High and Topeka West before falling in the nightcap to Blue Valley North.
“Overall, it was a good experience for us before going into Sub-State,” EHS coach Kendra Bloomquist said. “I thought we played some good competition, and we performed well against that competition.”
Emporia (25-13) started its night with a come-from-behind victory over Lawrence, 15-25, 25-14, 25-22.
Lawrence took Game One thanks to a 7-0 lead midway through that put the game out of reach. In the second and third games, Emporia jumped out to leads of 7-2 and 8-3 early and held off Lawrence the rest of the way to take the match, 2-1.
Jessica Decker finished with nine kills while Sadie Webb had seven and Ashley Lake and Hilary Heinrichs had six apiece. Heinrichs also led the way with 14 digs, while Lake and Decker had 12 each and Amber Miller had 11.
Emporia came out and overwhelmed Topeka West in the second match of the night, taking the straight-sets victory, 25-17, 25-15.
Again, Emporia built big leads to begin both games, taking a 7-1 lead in Game One and a 9-1 lead in Game Two. In Game One, the Lady Spartans were helped along by four service aces by Taylor Hollond, while four early kills by Webb helped EHS pull away in Game Two.
Webb finished with eight kills and Heinrichs had four, while Decker had 15 digs.
Emporia ran into trouble in the last match of the night against Blue Valley North, losing in three games, 25-27, 25-22, 25-19.
Bloomquist said uncharacteristic problems in the serve-receive game contributed to Emporia’s demise against an aggressive North squad.
“They caused our serve-receive game some headaches, which hasn’t happened a lot this year,” Bloomquist said.
EHS took a 1-0 lead after Game One thanks to two Lake kills that put Emporia ahead 26-25 late, and then a hitting error by North gave Emporia the game.
Games Two and Three were close early before North made a series of runs to put some distance between itself and the Lady Spartans, and in each game, EHS could not recover.
A bright spot for EHS was the play of its two middle hitters, Heinrichs and Lake. Heinrichs finished with 11 kills while Lake had nine.
“They didn’t have an answer for our middle attack,” Bloomquist said, “we just couldn’t get the ball to them (Heinrichs and Lake) enough.”
The Lady Spartans now move on to the postseason after compiling the best regular-season record in Bloomquist’s 11 years as Emporia’s coach. Sub-State play takes place Saturday, with Emporia traveling to Winfield.