Fall Mountain Improves in Defeat to John Stark

By Dan Barile
EAGLE TIMES CORRESPONDENT
The Fall Mountain girls volleyball team traveled to John Stark for its season opener on Wednesday, Sept. 6.

Coming off a season where they went 13-3 and reached the Division 2 semifinals, it was expected that John Stark would be a tough opponent.

Fall Mountain put forth a valiant effort but fell short in 3 sets by scores of 17-25, 16-25, 17-25.

“I was extremely pleased with how the girls played. We only have two returning varsity starters this year, so the alignments and positioning are very new to most of them. Had we served just a little bit better, we might have beaten them. So, we’ll take it, learn from it, and improve,” said head coach Missy Swift.

“Maddie Wilke had a tremendous game for us with 9 points, two kills, and four digs,” Swift said. “Jordyn Cheney had 4 points, two assists, two digs and was 7 for 9 with her serving. Cora Buswell had three digs and was very solid on serve receive and defense.”

The following day, Fall Mountain hosted Gilford in its home opener. Gilford won the match in 3 sets by scores of 25-12, 25-17, and 26-24.

“I was extremely pleased with the improvement of our play — both from Wednesday’s game to this one,” Swift said despite the loss.

“We talked quite a lot about how important serving percentage is because you can only score points if you make your serves. Not only that, but every serve you miss is a point for the other team. On Wednesday, we only had a 35% success rate against John Stark and we handed them 18 points on missed serves. Last night, we had an 88% success rate in our serves, only missing 6. That is a tremendous improvement and a real mark of how invested our team is in working toward success,” Swift said.

Emelia Jewell led the way at the service line, going 11 for 11 with 8 points. She also had two digs and a kill. Maebel Dussault was right behind her going seven for eight with five points, an ace, four digs and a kill. Addy Ratner had four points, an ace, two blocks and three kills. Maddie Wilke added five kills, two blocks and five digs and Jordyn Cheney was nine for nine serving with four points, an ace, and six assists.