After playing a new tune early in the week at Bennington, the Marion Warriors sounded a familiar sad note Saturday, losing all three matches at their home invitational.
?This is a good tournament,? coach Jim Versch said about the invitational. ?It?s a strong tournament, with good teams. So there?s good competition.?
The Warriors have a 6-11 record for the season.
Marion Invitational ?The Warriors began the day in pool play, losing to Halstead, 18-25, 13-25. after managing only six kills, then lost to Sedgwick, 20-25, 24-26, despite six kills from Whitney Gordon and five from Briana Hall.
They looked for redemption against Canton-Galva, but dropped a 13-25, 19-25, decision. Marion managed only four kills.
Bennington?Marion struggled early at the Bennington triangular Sept. 13.
?We?ve got to figure out a way to come out psyched up and ready to play because we came out so flat again,? coach Jim Versch said. ?It kind of looked like (playing) Berean Academy in the finals over at Centre. No fire.?
Marion lost to Bennington, 21-25, 25-27, in the first match.
?We could have won that game,? Versch said of the Game 2. ?It was close.?
The night of close games was not over, as Marion took on Moundridge next.
?This was actually a fun night, for the second match, because a week ago we went to Moundridge and we were terrible,? Versch said. ?I?m sure they came in thinking, ?It?s Marion. Been there, done that.? So, I think they were a little surprised to figure out they had to play too.?
The Warriors led during most of their first game on the way to a 25-23 win after Moundridge rallied late.
Game came out flat in Game 2, but put together a late surge for another 25-23 victory, thanks to great serving and a more cohesive defensive effort.
?They?re resilient, they keep fighting,? Versch said of his team. ?That was good for us.?
Marion?s Whitney Gordon had seven kills and two solo blocks for the night, with Annie Whitaker and Kaelyn Thierolf each contributing a kill. Katey Ehrlich had eight set assists.
Versch said the Warriors did try something new this week, with the coaches identifying a team?s weaker players and directing serves to those spots.
?Our servers are good enough they?re putting it where it needs to be, so that helped a little bit,? he said.
?We had an off, off night,? Versch added. ?Whitney wasn?t on, our sets were 3 feet off the net, passes weren?t to the setters, but they still played together and got it done.
?You?re going to have those off nights and good teams can get through those bad nights and still win.?
Coming up?The Warriors were scheduled to compete against Canton-Galva and Remington in a home quadrangular Sept. 20. They will host another quadrangular next Tuesday.
