Update, Friday, 10:30 a.m.: This story has been updated to remove incorrect information relating to the state tournament.
The Pagosa Springs High School Lady Pirates capped off their season by going 1-1 at regional action in Colorado Springs Saturday, Nov. 9.
The season ended on a high note, according to coach Katie Lorenzen.
Lorenzen suggested the team knew it would be a memorable weekend before ever setting foot on the court.
“We knew it was going to be a memorable weekend because we were driving into a storm and everyone was concerned about the major storm that was happening in Colorado Springs,” she said of Friday’s travel. “Luckily, we got there safely just before the roads totally froze over.”
When the team went to dinner, she relayed, vehicles were sliding all over the place.
The snowy start also led to delayed start to the action the following day, with play beginning at 1 p.m. instead of the originally scheduled 10 a.m. start time.
The No. 34 Lady Pirates first took on the No. 3 Village Mountaineers, who were playing in their first season under the Colorado High School Activities Association, according to Lorenzen.
Lorenzen highlighted the school has multiple students training for the Olympics, as well as having a volleyball player who is committed to Standford.
“They’re kind of like an elite club team in 3A all of a sudden, so it was interesting to play against them,” she said.
The Mountaineers won in three sets: 25-12, 25-16 and 25-21.
“We lost in three, but we got better each set,” the coach said. “We forced them to call a timeout in the third set when we had a lead, and we barely lost in the third set, 21-25. I was just really proud of the girls for never giving up, even when we were trying to block and dig against a player that could just crush the ball basically anywhere on the court. There’s a reason why she has a hitting percentage over .500 on the season — she’s good and she can hit wherever the defense is not.”
Lorenzen noted that in the day’s final game between Village and Banning Lewis Academy, that hitter’s attack hit the other team’s libero in the face.
“Our girls were out there and reacting and making every move for the ball, working really hard, and I was just really proud of them for how hard they fought against a very elite team,” she added.
Lorenzen noted there were some standouts in the game for the Lady Pirates.
Lexi Campbell, she highlighted, led the team in kills and hitting percentage. She had nine kills and only one error on 25 swings and hit .320 — the same stats she recorded against Banning Lewis Academy in the next game.
“She also added seven digs and was passing really well that game,” Lorenzen said. “They were a tough-serving team and we made a lot of adjustments passing, ... moving players differently to try to have their server serve at different people, and they were really tough, but Lexi definitely passed really well.”
The team had 20 total kills against Village.
The Lady Pirates logged three serving aces — one each from Aspen Pitcher, Campbell and Hayden Peterson.
Lorenzen added Campbell and Peterson each served 11 times, “which tells you that the team was playing well behind those servers when they had that many runs.”
The Lady Pirates had two total blocks in the matchup, with Dawson Iverson, Cadence Kerns, Campbell and Pitcher each notching an assisted block.
Pitcher led the defense in digs with nine of the team’s 28.
Sophia Sottek tallied 16 of the team’s 17 assists, and Campbell led in serve receiving with 27 of the team’s 57 service receptions.
“Village was just a really high-level team, and it was exciting to play against that and see our girls rise to the occasion,” Lorenzen said.
After a 15-minute break, the Lady Pirates then took on the No. 22 Banning Lewis Academy Stallions.
“Our girls were pretty gassed, and they somehow then found it in them and dug deep and played their hearts out to pull off an upset,” she said.
The Lady Pirates beat the Stallions 3-1, dropping the first set 27-25 before winning the next three sets, 25-22, 25-14 and 25-17, respectively.
“They just stayed steady against a team that had some really good players,” Lorenzen sad. “We stayed aggressive and steady and hustled, and we had a number of coverage plays and reactionary plays where, I think for a lot of the season, we’d maybe have a first touch and no one reacted after that, and in these games we had those reactions just happening and it just led to a lot of excitement.”
She added the bench was so excited the whole time it even received a yellow card for the players jumping all over the place.
She added that’s not a problem to get a card when the players are so into the game.
Pitcher logged a double-double, leading the team in kills with 13 in the match while hitting .200 and tallying 23 digs “all over the place in the backcourt.”
She was followed by Cadence Kerns, who had 12 kills.
“Cadence had the most amount of swings with 37 attacks, which is a little unusual for a middle to have more swings than an outside, but she was also hitting some back-row pipes and getting some kills there,” Lorenzen said.
Campbell had nine kills and again hit .320, as well as 14 digs, with Lorenzen pointing out she played “really, really well in the back row” and passed well.
The team had 41 total kills and 69 digs.
The Lady Pirates had five total blocks, which included a solo block by Pitcher, three assisted blocks by Campbell and four by Kerns.
“Sophia had 32 assists and did a really good job mixing up the offense, finding her hitters and just really trying to fire everyone up when everyone was pretty tired. And she definitely just kept going,” Lorenzen said.
The team totaled 36 assists.
The Lady Pirates logged 16 aces in the matchup, with the coach highlighting that the team also had some really long service runs.
Sottek had 25 serve attempts against the Stallions and four aces, while Kerns had 24 serve attempts and five aces.
Honestye Sweet logged three aces in 12 service attempts, giving her the highest percentage of aces to attempts for the team in the game.
“And what was really cool was that the last few points of that game, when we won, all four seniors were on the court and contributing to those last few points, so that was really cool,” Lorenzen said.
The team had 55 service receptions, led by 22 from Pitcher.
She added that pulling off the upset in a back-to-back match after “already playing their hearts out” was good for the team, especially the younger girls, to see how well the team can play when there’s a lot of excitement and effort.
Lorenzen noted the win “was a testament to the girls wanting to end on a high note.”
Pagosa’s win, however, left who would advance to the state tournament in limbo, with Village and Banning Lewis Academy facing off next and the Lady Pirates’ season on the line.
Had the Stallions upset the Mountaineers, there would have been a three-way tie and there would have been matches to break the tie.
Village went on to beat Banning Lewis Academy in three sets: 25-11, 25-18 and 25-12.
“At that point, our season was officially over,” Lorenzen said, adding the team had its post-game chat, where the team talked about how hard they worked that day and that she was “so proud” that they ended on a high note.
The Lady Pirates ended the season with an 11-4 overall record and 2-6 league mark.
Lorenzen noted that, looking back on the season, one of the things that stands out to her with the team is the excitement the Lady Pirates brought into the huddle during the good times, and the true fun that was being had and the excitement for players doing well.
The team will lose four senior players from this year’s roster: Kerns, Pitcher, Sottek and Sweet.
Kerns, Lorenzen highlighted, “really worked her way up through this program and improved a ton, especially we saw it at the end of last season when we put her in the middle after an injury and all of a sudden she was a different ... player in the middle than on the right side. It was like things just clicked, and this year to play defense really for the first time on varsity, and she really just became an all-around player.”
Pitcher, according to the coach, has been the “linchpin of Pirate volleyball for most of her high school career.”
She added Pitcher was always a steady player who would give her all no matter what.
“She’s just steady out there and you never have to ask her to work harder — she is always giving her best,” Lorenzen said.
The coach noted Sottek moved to Pagosa last year and this year “really stepped up big time in leading the team and as a short setter, that can be really hard, especially in this league against some bigger players, but she wasn’t ever afraid and was ready to play all the way around from moment one.”
She added Sottek put up really consistent balls this year for her hitters, which made it easier for them to succeed.
Lorenzen complimented Sweet’s work ethic and improvement.
“She came in knowing that she wasn’t going to see a whole lot of court time and she wanted to be part of the team anyway, and that meant all the same working out, conditioning, all of that with less glory on the court. But she definitely overcame some mental obstacles this year and became a real great serving specialist for us and finished the season with a couple aces in the final games, and that was really neat to see how much she has progressed over the years and even this season.”
randi@pagosasun.com
