Published: August 15, 2009 10:52 pm      

Lady Bruins go 2-2 without top hitter

Dalton and Northwest Whitfield’s volleyball team’s hit the court for the first time in the 2009 season at the Sequoyah Classic in Cherokee, and both coaches liked what they saw from their teams on Saturday.

The Lady Bruins went 2-2 in their matches, despite being without one of their best players, 6-foot-4-inch outside hitter Christy Robinson, who suffered a shoulder injury last weekend in a scrimmage at Dalton High.

The Lady Catamounts went 1-3.

“I think (Northwest) and Dalton are both at a disadvantage in these beginning-of-the-year tournaments because a lot of the Atlanta schools that play in this also play year-round,” Lady Bruins coach Richard Taylor said. “Last year we lost to St. Pius here, but we beat them later in the year. We’ll see how things go.”

Northwest opened with wins over Woodstock (27-25, 25-8) and Campbell (25-15, 25-16) before losing to Oconee County (25-16, 25-19) and Starr’s Mill (25-15, 25-15).

Leaders for the Lady Bruins were Quaneisha McCurty with 21 kills and seven blocks, Kelsey Kirk with 20 kills, 12 digs and five blocks, Morgan Ridley with seven kills and two blocks, Adrien Orem, who was 30-for-30 on serves with two aces and 16 digs and freshman Laura Stevens — filling in for Robinson — with six kills and six digs to go with 23-of-24 serving.

“She was very strong in her first-ever varsity start,” Richards said of Stevens. “We just kind of threw her into the fire.

“I thought, as a team, we did well today. Without Christy in there, our outside game was limited, but the middle game worked well. I was pretty proud.”

The Lady Catamounts beat Cherokee (25-19, 19-25, 25-21) but lost to Chamblee (25-20, 25-23) and Walton (25-8, 25-13).

Though the Walton match appears by the score to be lopsided, it’s the match that impressed coach Lisa Donahue the most. No other team at the tourney scored more than five points against them.

“We did good against them,” Donahue said. “They’re one of the top teams in their classification (Region 1-5A).”

Emily Harbin (12 kills), Lindsey Smedley (11 kills), Kathryn Sigmon (35 assists, 11 aces) led the Lady Catamounts.

“It was a good tournament to see where we’re at and where we’re are against other teams in the state, as well as what we need to work on” Donahue said. “There’s potential there, and once we get some consistency we should be fine this year.”

Varsity softball

• Murray County won four of six games in the Model tournament on Friday and Saturday and finished in third place. The Lady Indians are now 5-2 on the season and in those two setbacks committed 17 errors.

• Gordon Central 11, Murray 5: Courtney Welch was 3-for-3 with three stolen bases and one run scored and Brandi Norman had two hits.

• Murray County 4, Trion 2: Sarah Kilgore and Karli Timms each had two hits and scored a run for the Lady Indians.

Kilgore was the winning pitcher.

• Murray County 8, Model 3: Kilgore and Timms again had two hits each, with Timms driving in three runs for Murray. She also was the winning pitcher.

• Murray County 3, Cedartown 1: Kilgore got the Lady Indians’ Saturday schedule off on the right track by picking up the winning and collecting two hits.

• Murray County 5, Coosa 2: Welch had a two-run double, Savannah Bearden had two hits and one RBI and Timms was the winning pitcher.

• Adairsville 7, Murray County 2: The Lady Indians’ defense committed seven errors and all seven Adairsville runs were unearned, with Kilgore taking the loss. Welch collected two hits, stole two more stolen and drove in a run.