The Lady Trojans played the Beatty Hornets volleyball team Tuesday afternoon winning 3-0. Regardless of the win, Trojans Coach Jill Harris believes her team still needs work. She said the wins against Beatty were not easy.
“Beatty was scrappy and they picked up a lot of balls. They played well. They are not afraid to swing at anything and they are aggressive. They knew there was going to be a lot of balls coming back. Beatty played really scrappy at the tournament (in Pahrump),” Harris said.
League play for the girls starts next week against Mojave on Sept. 26 and the coach has a laundry list she feels she wants to accomplish beforehand. Harris and her squad confronted Del Sol yesterday, which was too late to report, and has a tourney in Boulder City Friday and Saturday to get things done.
“We are still struggling with rotation,” Harris said. “The team still has to get the second setter going. We have two setters. We are looking at Jill and Shayla. Jill will probably be doing it. Not to say if she falls apart Shayla can’t go back in for her, because she can.”
Setters determine the tempo of the game in volleyball. If the setting is not good, the offense can stall. Against Beatty the Trojans had moments of brilliance, but one could still see the need to get some continuity in the setting. Harris agreed her offense needs a bit of a spark and said, “I thought we were OK offensively. I think we are still doing a lot of standing around on defense, so it’s hard to get your offense going. We are doing a lot of poking at the ball. Maybe if it was a faster game — I don’t know.”
Harris said time is running out to get all the little details down, but a long tourney usually helps bring things together. At Boulder the girls will play three games Friday at 3 p.m., 5 p.m. and 7 p.m., against Lake Mead, Del Sol and Basic in that order. Harris’ goals for the tourney are many, but her main goal is for the girls to come together as a team.
“I am hoping that we gel a little bit more and become a little bit more confident in the rotations. For the setters, it wasn’t working the way I wanted it to, and I wanted it to work the other way. It just isn’t. Even if it does not work I have other options. The problem is they need to get the right setter so the hitting is right,” she said.