No. 9 Saints overcome scrappy Clarksville
By Kristi Nixon
ST. ANSGAR — As the Class 1A No. 9-ranked St. Ansgar volleyball team quickly found out, the Saints can’t take any team for granted, no matter the record.
A scrappy five-win Clarksville team came into St. Ansgar with an upset in mind, leading for much of the first set of the Class 1A Region 6 opener until coach Tyler Johnson’s team took over with a serving run by Aspen Falk that gave the Saints set point.
“They were especially scrappy in that first game,” Johnson said. “Picking up balls and I think their record might have gotten our kids a little over-confident coming in. Our communication wasn’t there at the start of the game. Some of the goofy balls and sloppy stuff, we weren’t talking and weren’t picking those up and it was showing on the scoreboard.
“We had quite a few unforced hitting errors. So, it seemed like we were scoring a lot of points for them. We weren’t getting a close and weren’t sealing the net very well. Stuff was going off our hands in all kinds of directions.”
Junior outside hitter Sophie Urbatsch added, “We tend to really overlook and we get in our mind we’re over-confident, but after we settled down and started swinging inbounds, we really got together. That’s how we do in second and third set.”
According to Johnson, the difference in turning around the opening set was communication.
“I think just settling down and talking better,” Johnson said. “Once we started talking better on the court, our defense picked up, our ball control improved. Our swings got much better after that. I don’t know we had many hitting errors after the first game was over. We got a little angry at ourselves after the first game. We said, ‘okay, let’s pick it up from here.’”
Urbatsch, who unofficially had five kills and put together a couple of big serving runs along with As. Falk to turn the tide. In the second set, Urbatsch had 16 straight serves, forcing Clarksville to call timeout twice during her run.
“She was actually, her and Aspen both had their serves going pretty good,” Johnson said. “I know there were some times where, in the first game, they were passing them pretty well, high passes still making it right to the setter. After they got that going a little bit, forcing them to move for the serve receive, dropping in front of them hard, obviously it changed the whole tone of the night and forced them out of the serve receive for the night.”
Urbatsch added, “I don’t know, they were giving (me) good spots. We normally go on a good run, me and Aspen, and that really helped in the second set, and it’s hard to come back (from that).”
The win advanced the Saints to a meeting on Wednesday, Oct. 18 with Riceville, a 3-2 winner over Turkey Valley, something that threw Johnson’s scouting report out the window when he admitted he spent an hour looking at film on Turkey Valley on Sunday.
“We know, whoever it is, every single step of regional play, they are going to be better and better and better…” Johnson said. “So, we have to make sure we get a scouting report going, know what to expect and most importantly, execute.”
Urbatsch added, “I think it’s going to be good competition, but if we play well, that we have a good chance and can go pretty far. I think we are going to have to watch some film on Riceville.”
