September 7, 2012
By Kevin Trudgeon

WINCHESTER — With the bitter taste of a home-opening loss to Musselman (W.Va.) a week earlier still lingering, the James Wood volleyball team got back to doing what it does best Thursday night — winning.

Against an overmatched Jefferson (W.Va.) side that struggled to get anything going all night long, the Colonels dominated in a 3-0 (25-13, 25-14, 25-8) sweep on their home court.

“We definitely came in focused on working on certain things [from the Musselman match] and just trying to improve,” said James Wood senior outside hitter Tarah Wampler.
The Colonels (4-1) were firing on all cylinders early on as sophomore outside hitter Katie Houser opened the first set with a clean kill over the top of the Jefferson block.

Two service errors and three hitting errors by the Colonels allowed Jefferson (1-3) to hang around, closing to within two at 11-9 following a kill by freshman Mallory Jackson and a miscue by Houser, but James Wood quickly responded.

Senior middle blocker Erica Hepner keyed a 5-0 run with a pair of aces to stretch the lead to 16-9 and fellow senior Kelby Jackson closed out the set from the service line, capping a late five-point run with three straight aces to give the Colonels the 1-0 lead.

“We definitely try and place our serves to certain people to try and get the ace and I thought we did a good job of that,” said Wampler, who helped the Colonels to 12 aces in the match.

The going didn’t get any easier for the Cougars in the second set.

James Wood scored nine of the first 10 points and raced out to a 22-9 lead behind a potent attack.

Houser, Hepner, Jackson, sophomore Ashley Hillyard, Wampler, junior Brandi Griffith and even senior setter Emilee Payne all recorded kills for the Colonels as Jefferson simply had no answer on defense.

“We hadn’t seen that yet, that’s the first time we’ve seen hitters of that caliber,” said Jefferson coach Ryan Mills. “[We] were standing up a lot instead of being low and being ready for the ball.

“We have a very young team and they don’t have a lot of confidence in themselves right now and they just shut themselves down. We know how to pass the ball, we just didn’t do it.”

With a starting lineup consisting of four freshman and a sophomore, the Cougars’ inexperienced showed against a veteran James Wood squad.

Three hitting errors allowed the Colonels to close out the second set at 25-14 and things didn’t get any better in the third set.

Houser, who finished with a match-high 14 kills, sent a cross down the net to open the set and it was all James Wood from there.

Back-to-back kills by Wampler put the Colonels up 13-4 and a six-point run with the senior serving ended any hopes that Jefferson had of extending the match.

“I wanted to see more accuracy with our shots and they looked good,” said James Wood coach Jill Couturiaux. “We want to be purposefully putting balls into certain locations instead of just swinging and attempting more aggressive shots and going after shots versus just putting the ball in play on offense.”

A kill by Jackson, who switched from her libero position in the third set, and another Cougar hitting error clinched the set and the match for James Wood.

Jackson finished with a team-high five aces, Payne totaled 19 assists and sophomore Allyson Iden added nine digs in the win.

The Colonels next travel to take on Washington (W.Va.) at 7 p.m. on Monday to kick off a three-match week that will include a rematch with Musselman on the road.

“This feels good [to get the win] and we’re ready to go into next week,” Wampler said. “We know the things we need to work on and we’re preparing a lot for [the rematch with Musselman] next week. We’re ready to go and we want to win.”

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