Sandpoint volleyball tops Moscow in three sets, Hicks tallies 18 kills
SANDPOINT — The Bulldog volleyball team is starting to hit their stride.
Sandpoint took down Moscow in straight sets Tuesday night at Les Rogers Court to claim its second straight victory after going winless in its first six matches.
The Bulldogs won 25-21, 26-24, 26-24.
"It's fun for them to sing the fight song on their home court," head coach Karen Alsager said after the match, "it's been a while since we've been able to do that, so that was fun."
Senior Gabby Hicks led the Bulldogs with 18 kills and 11 digs. Hicks gave credit to her teammates for allowing her to be so effective.
"Honestly, that was like the best round of setting that we've had so far," she said. "I think it came from our passes mostly and then our setters were delivering some really good balls where I could work around the block."
Senior CeCe Deprez returned to her starting role at setter after missing a couple games with a concussion. Deprez finished with 15 set assists and Alsager was glad to have her back.
"She's provided very good ball control for us this year," Alsager said about Deprez, "and she's putting the ball in really hittable spots for our hitters."
Sandpoint took the lead in the first set and never relinquished it. Senior Bella Phillips hit a kill to seal the opening set win.
The two teams went back-and-forth in the second set, but the Bulldogs held on to put the Bears in a 2-0 hole.
Moscow jumped out to a 11-5 in the third set. Alsager could feel the momentum slipping away, so she called a timeout and got her team back on track. Sandpoint went on a 12-3 run to take the lead and force Moscow to burn a timeout. The Bears slowly crawled their way back and fought off three match points, but junior Lauren Breuner ended their hopes with a kill to seal the Inland Empire League victory for the Bulldogs.
Hicks said the Bulldogs are getting better with every touch and the phrase "winning streak" has a nice ring to it.
"It's so amazing," she said. "I think our team kind of had a talk like, 'OK now we got to stop messing around, we really got to start focusing in and start executing balls, not every ball has to be a kill it just has to be in.'"
Breuner tallied 13 set assists for the Bulldogs, Kinzie Ward and Sam Koster each had eight digs and Phillips added six kills and three blocks.
Makayla Gilkey led Moscow with six kills and Morgan Claus had 11 digs.
Sandpoint (2-6, 1-1 IEL) gets a week off before heading to Post Falls 7 p.m. next Tuesday. Alsager said the team plans on taking advantage of the extra practice time.
"I think our setters did well and our passers did really good, but we know we can play better than that," she said.
