This past Saturday, August 31, the Lennox High School Orioles went to Canton for the Canton Invitational tournament for their first competition of the season. At the end of the day, the Lady O’s came out with a fourth-place finish and 2-2 record.
The morning started with a match against West Sioux (IA). There were very minimal stats from the first set since junior, Addison Martz, managed to serve 18 consecutive serves followed by junior, Hannah Adney, serving five to close it out, winning the first set 25-1. The second set finished at 25-11. Stat leaders for this match were Adney with six aces, sophomore, Rylee Hedin, with seven kills, freshman, Libby Kranz, with five kills and a block and senior, Ella Grengs, with nine assists.
The second match of the morning was against Baltic. The Lady O’s let this one slip away with a 21-25, 21-25 loss.
“It was a fantastic match as both teams were equally matched in both attacks and defense,” said head coach Vanessa Gabel. “It really could have gone either way.”
Stat leaders for this match were Adney with two aces, senior, Lilly Meyer, with 25 serve receives and ten digs, Kranz with ten kills, Grengs with nine kills and 15 assists.
The last pool play match of the morning was against Vermillion with a 25-20 and 25-2 win. Again, Martz was strong from the service line and started the second set strong with 22 consecutive serves and seven aces total. Other match stat leaders were sophomore, Mallorie Bittner and Kranz with five kills each, Bittner with three blocks, Grengs with 14 assists and senior, Gavyn Herlyn, with five digs. Martz may have set a new Lennox record for consecutive serves in a game with 22.
Cross pool play paired the Orioles against West Lyon (IA) for the third place match. The Lady O’s fell short with a 16-25 and 22-25 loss. Junior, Andie Peters led the team with three aces and seven digs, Kranz with 16 serve receives, junior, Ryan Hanssen led with four kills while Grengs added four kills and 11 assists.
“Overall, the team had a great first showing of the season even with the record not indicating as such,” said Gabel. “The hustle on the court was impressive against a couple solid competitors. The second and third efforts chasing down balls was memorable. Now that the first game jitters are out, they’ll have some more consistently played matches going forward.”
Upcoming for the Orioles are matches on Thursday, September 5 at Tri-Valley and Monday, September 9, when Lennox plays host to Canton in their first home match of the year, beginning at 7 p.m.
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