Things got interesting on Friday, Oct. 1 when the Longview Lady Lobos volleyball team travelled to Sulphur Springs to take on the Lady Cats.
Coach Bailey Dorner’s team took set one in dominating fashion, 25-12 as they looked to rebound from Tuesday’s loss in Hallsville.
While the Lady Lobos were able to to make the second set more competitive, they fell short to Sulphur Springs 25-17 to allow the Lady Cats to take a demanding 2-0 set lead over Longview.
The Lady Lobos, realizing a defeat would drastically hurt their potential playoff positioning, played hard in set three, never relenting and managed to steal the third set 26-24.
Set four proved to be a repeat, as even though Sulphur Springs was able to jump out to several big leads, Longview kept fighting and took set four 27-25 to force a pivotal set five.
Coach Dorner and her squad did what they do best when down; they fought back with their back against the wall and still pulled out a huge 15-5 set five win that propelled the Lady Cats to their fourth district win in six contests.
The win gives the volleyball team an 18-12 overall record (4-2 district). Sulphur Springs is now officially halfway through the fall 2021 district season.
The win also firmly put the Lady Cats in fourth place in District 15-5A.
Longview came into the game 2-3 in district, with Sulphur Springs a game ahead at 3-2. If the Lady Cats wished to keep up with Texas High, Marshall and Hallsville, they had to beat the Lady Lobos to keep up with the three teams who have two losses or less in district play.
They did just that, and while the Lady Cats have the same district record as Hallsville, the Tuesday loss at Bobcat Coliseum gives Hallsville the tiebreaker.
Hallsville and Sulphur Springs will meet again for hotly contest playoff seeding when Hallsville comes to the SSHS Main Gym on Oct. 22.
But before they can focus on the top three teams in District 15-5A they will have to get past the Mt. Pleasant Lady Tigers when they come to town on Tuesday.
Sulphur Springs swept the Lady Tigers in Mt. Pleasant 3-0 for a district-opening sweep on Sept. 10.
Coach Bailey Dorner and her program will no doubt hope for similar results when the Mount Pleasant Lady Tigers come to the SSHS Main Gym on Tuesday, Oct. 5.
That match is set to begin with JV and freshmen squads at 5 P.M. followed by the varsity showdown at 6 P.M.
Tuesday’s game, if given permission by Mount Pleasant, will be live-streamed onto KSST Radio’s YouTube channel.
Regardless of livestream capabilities, Tuesday’s volleyball matchup with the Lady Tigers will be broadcasted on KSST 1230 AM.
KSST is proud to be the official Wildcat and Lady Cat Station. We broadcast Sulphur Springs ISD games year round live on radio. When allowed, we also broadcast games via our YouTube channel.
