Wimberley High School was perfect for the week as the Lady Texans defeated both the Cuero Lady Gobblers and Navarro Panthers to wrap up the second seed in the district standings.
In Wimberley’s game against Cuero, outside hitter Laney Hennessee led the way with 21 kills and four aces with Addison Parks, adding another eight kills as the Lady Texans pulled out with the win against the Gobblers 3-1 on Tuesday night.
“Right now, we’re focused on making the playoffs and going to state.” Hennessee said.
Wimberley came out strong in the first set, going on a massive 10-2 run to set the tone for the game early on. This immediately put Cuero in a tough spot; with their backs against the wall, they called a timeout. Coming out of the timeout, Cuero went on a run of their own, finding themselves up 1714. The set was close the whole way, but Wimberley was not able to regain the lead and gave the set to Cuero 25-22.
Wimberley led the second set the entire time, but by no more than four points. Cuero tied it up at 20 a piece. With the game on the line, two big back-to-back kills by #15 (Addison Parks) and #10 (Hennessee) gave the Lady Texans the momentum to go on a clean 5-0 run to take the set 25-20 and tie the match up at one set a piece.
“After letting them go on massive runs, we woke up and played a little Wimberley volleyball and put it all together.” Head Coach Stephanie Barthels said.
Set Three saw Wimberley going down early 4-1, but they didn’t stay down long as #15 Parks found herself in the middle of the action. Back to back kills gave Wimberley the momentum to take the lead and never look back. The Lady Gobblers only scored eight more points after Parks’ momentum-changing kills, leading the Lady Texans to a 2512 Set Three win.
Set Four was also a slow start for Wimberley, going down 2-6, but after back to back kills by #10, the Lady Texans found themselves with another momentum swing and back in the lead. They never looked back, taking the set 25-17 and winning the match three sets to one.
“Our focus right now is making sure we finish strong in the district,” Barthels said. “If we lose Friday night against Navarro, we will be tied for second place in district. We don’t want to be stuck in that predicament.”
The Wimberley Lady Texans took on the Navarro Panthers on Friday, Oct. 20 in a match that would decide who finished in second place in the district behind Davenport. The Lady Texans took Navarro down three sets to none in a perfect sweep.
“We worked on finding where their weaknesses were and attacking those, our serve received, and we really worked on when we swung to keep the ball in play,” Barthels said.
Set One was about as close as you could get with both teams fighting back and forth to hang on to a one point lead most of the set, with Wimberley finding themselves down 18-19 late in the set. The Lady Texans went on a run with back to back kills from #15 Parks and #10 Hennessey, followed by a block from Parks. This forced Navarro to call a timeout, finding themselves down 21-19. The timeout would not stop the momentum of the Lady Texans as they took the first set 25-22.
“I think we started off a little slow, but we picked it up and our energy really helped,” Parks said.
Set Two was a mirror reflection of Set One as neither team could pull away. Wimberley found themselves down again late in the set 17-19. With a kill, block and an ace, they forced Navarro to call another timeout late in the set as Wimberley took the lead 20-19. History repeated itself , and the Lady Texans took the second set 25-22.
In Set Three, Wimberley showed how deep of a team they are; six different players racked up a kill in the set. As a result, the team was able to pull away early in the set and coast to a 25-16 win, sweeping the Panthers.
“It was tit for tat the entire night, but overall, I thought we played really under control. I was really proud of the girls, because this was the deciding factor for second place. I was really happy with competing and finishing in three; we played our best,” Barthels said.
The Texans will take on rival Canyon Lake High School in the rematch of the Battle of the Backbone and the last game of districts before playoffs. Wimberley will look to finish off strong as they swept Canyon Lake 3-0 in the first round of districts.
