No. 15-ranked Lady Tiger volleyball team drops another road match

Continuing its tough, early season schedule, the No. 15-ranked Cowley College volleyball team dropped its second straight road match Monday at Cloud County by a score of 15-25, 21-25, 25-23, 23-25.

Cowley is now 2-2 overall and 1-2 in the Jayhawk Conference Eastern Division. Cloud County improves to 2-1 overall and 2-1 in conference play.

"Cloud did a good job of not allowing us to make runs," Cowley head coach Steven Gream said. "It seemed we just could never catch up."

On Monday, Cloud would score the first six points of set one and cruise to the 25-15 win.

Once again, the T-Birds started strong in set two as they jumped out to a 9-3 advantage. However, Cowley showed some fight to pull within 15-14, but could not regain the lead while falling 25-21.

Trailing 10-5 in set three, Cowley would grab its first lead of the set at 17-16 following a kill by freshman Macy Shreffler. This time, the Lady Tigers would prevail 25-23 to force a fourth set.

Cowley would fight back from deficits of 7-3 and 15-11 in set four as they rallied to tie the score at 21-21 following three straight kills by Shreffler. However, Cloud would score four of the final six points to take the match in four sets.

As a team, Cloud County would finish the match with a .280 attack percentage while allowing the Lady Tigers to hit just .200 as a team.

"We hit too low of a percentage and did not do a good job with our serve," Gream said.

Shreffler finished with a career-high 17 kills, while Iva Halacheva added 18 kills and 11 digs.

"Macy is coming along well. She and Iva have been carrying us in these first four matches," Gream said. "We need some other positions to step up and take some pressure off them."

Fellow freshmen Erin Thompson (26 digs) and Gracie Story (39 assists) also played well in the defeat.

Sophomore middle blocker Geraldyn Palacios led Cloud County with 25 kills, while the T-Birds Jaycee Burghart finished the match with 47 assists.

Cowley will attempt to earn its first road win of the season when they play at Neosho County Thursday at 6:30 p.m. The Lady Panthers are 2-1 overall and 2-0 in the Jayhawk East following a five-set win at Fort Scott on Monday.

"Neosho is always tough," Gream said. "We need to take care of what we can control. We need to limit our unforced errors and play more consistent volleyball."