Dave Maxwell
Brook Higbee, yellow shirt, the team’s only senior, rallies the Pahranagat Valley girls volleyball team. The Lady Panthers are at Beatty today and host The Meadows on Tuesday.
When the coach of the team that beats you still compliments you on having played good defense, you must be doing something right.
That happened a few times for the Pahranagat Valley High School girls volleyball team in the Boulder City Invitational tournament last week, according to PVHS coach Ginger Whipple. “The coaches often told that to our players, about their solid defensive work, they didn’t tell me.”
In the games played on Friday, Pahranagat Valley defeated Virgin Valley 25-19, 25-19; lost to Basic 25-18, 25-19 and beat Liberty 25-18, 25-17.
Then on Saturday, they lost their first two matches to Bonanza 25-22, 25-12; to Las Vegas 25-20, 25-14; but ended the day with a win over Calvary Chapel, 25-14, 25-18.
Playing in the tournament as the only Division IV school, with teams taller and somewhat stronger than themselves, Whipple said it is “always a good learning experience for us. Even when we lose, we gain confidence. That’s the whole reason we went. This is where we get the best competition.”
“These are perfect matches for us,” she said. “I felt we competed and I was pleased with their performance. We were in it most times. We grew up a lot in this tournament, but we still have a lot of work to do on aspects of our serve-receive.”
Sometimes, the bigger teams may not think a Division IV team has any point being on the same floor with them, but as has happened several times in past years, “We surprised some of those teams,” Whipple said.
The girls did have a let down against Bonanza, leading most of the first game, only to have the Bengals rally for the win and then take the second game also. “They started blocking us and we were not making the adjustments,” Whipple said.
But in the win over Virgin Valley, she said, “We caught them off guard, I think.” Off guard, because the Panthers had lost 3-1 to the Bulldogs just two weeks earlier.
Starting this week with a league match against Adelson (0-3, 1-0) on Wednesday, the Lady Panthers (13-5, 2-0) have seven of their final 10 matches in the regular season on their home floor, including The Meadows Oct. 6 and Word of Life Oct. 9, both at 5 p.m.
