Trinity volleyball wins home invitational

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Coach Faith Wilder-Newland says her Trinity Lutheran volleyball team is peaking at the right time.

“I think we’re getting better and better each weekend, each match,” she said after the Cougars topped Purdue Polytechnic 25-5, 25-6; beat Indianapolis Metropolitan 25-7, 25-7; and defeated Jennings County 25-22, 25-18 in the Trinity Lutheran Invitational on Saturday.

The Cougars have won their last 12 matches in straight sets, giving them a 33-set win streak.

“The big thing that is encouraging is that when we make mistakes, those are things that we totally control, usually either serving or defensively getting in the right position,” Wilder-Newland said. “So those are things that are easily fixable.

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“So I think that’s kind of the good news and the bad news. We’re just going to keep working on it, but it has gotten a lot better.”

The Cougars led both Purdue Poly and Indy Metro from start to finish to register easy wins in those matches.

Trinity had to work harder to defeat Jennings County.

In the first set against Jennings, the score was tied several times, the last at 19, before the Cougars took control with four straight points with the final two points coming on a tip and a kill by Hannah Sabotin.

Set point came on a passing error by the Panthers.

Jennings held a 5-3 lead in the second set before a block by Sydney Jaynes tied the score at 5, and an ace by Bailey Reynolds put the Cougars on top 8-5. The Cougars led the rest of the match but didn’t pull away until after Jennings closed the difference to 14-13.

Back-to-back kills by Kennedy Hoffman and Sabotin increased Trinity’s lead to 20-15. Abby Schult had a kill for match point.

Trinity’s leading servers were Paige Lawrence was 23-for-24 (seven aces) with 17 points, and Reynolds 19-for-20 (six aces) with 14 points.

Trinity had 55 attack kills with Sabotin leading with 21, Jaynes had 10 and Schult nine. Sabotin had eight blocks, and Jaynes and Schult had four each. Reynolds had 36 assists.

“Blocking was pretty good overall,” Wilder-Newland said. “I think our offense is definitely one of our strong points. Blocking is coming around. We have to keep working on the back-court play.”

Kamzi Gross was the leader in digs with 20, Savannah Harweger had nine and Elly Carter had six.

“Serve-receive has gotten better,” Wilder-Newland said. “Defensively, we’re still working on it.

“It’s always nice to win a tournament. I thought we played pretty intensely overall. The early matches and that second set especially (against Jennings) was good.”

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