Off to a good start

The Cowley College Lady Tigers opened the national tournament with a convincing 3-0 (30-17, 20-28, 30-27) win over Grand Rapids Thursday morning.
Cowley cruised in the first game and then held off a furious rally by Grand Rapids.
Coach Joanna Pryor was glad to see the team get off to a fast start and was not too surprised to see Grand Rapids play them tougher in the second and third games.
"I didn't think they would lay down. This is the nationals, so I thought they (Grand Rapids) would step it up against us," she said. "We had a few lulls, but I thought we stayed strong throughout and closed."
In the first game Cowley got kills from four different players in a 5-0 run that gave the team a 13-6 lead. Lillian Rezende had three consecutive kills late that sealed the win.
The second game was much closer, though Cowley built a 20-15 lead to one a couple of times, but could not overtake the Lady Tigers.
Grand Rapids managed to tie the game at 27. A block by Coutney Shanklin gave Cowley a 29-28 lead. The winning point came on a serving error by Grand Rapids.
The third game was just as close. Cowley lead 8-3 but Grand Rapids came back and tied the game at 10-10.
From there it was close with Cowley building a four-point lead that it held until near the end when Grand Rapids managed to cut the lead to two.
Pryor said she was a bit concerned in the second game and used a couple timeouts to calm the team down and to break momentum Grand Rapids was building.
"I really didn't want to lose that second game. If you are going to lose one, it's better to lose the third one," she said.
In the third game Cowley seemed to be in control, but at times they were a bit too relaxed for Pryor's taste.
"They drive me crazy sometimes with that, but it is good to play relaxed," she said.

STATS
Lucie Cizmarova, 16 kills.
Lillian Rezende 12 kills, 11 digs
Crystal Garmon 9 kills
Victoria Green 8 kills, 4 blocks.

What the players are saying.

Sophomore Courtney Shanklin was relaxed because she had been here last year and knew what to expect.
"I felt like it was a regular season game. I was just calm," she said.
She felt the team had a good game, but she said the teams would get tougher as the Lady Tigers advance.
"We could do better on our serving. That's likely to matter at the end of the game at some point," she said.

Sophomore Lillian Rezende said the team let up a bit in the second game after winning the first one relatively easily.
"I think we made more mistakes in the second game," she said.

Lucie Cizmarova said she was relaxed but felt the game was more important.
"It just felt exciting, like I was playing in a more important game," she said.

Sophomore Andrea Mitchell had a good game setting and spent a lot of the game on the front row.
The game felt intense to her, and she said that is the way she likes the games to be.
"We did kind of let up in the second game, but we still won."
Once the Lady Tigers took a 2-0 lead in the best of five series, Mitchell said she felt the team had the match wrapped up.
"We should have killed them, but we knew we had it." she said.

There were a couple of double passes in the match which set up nice kills.
Mitchell passed to Crystal Garmon, who passed back to Mitchell who then set up Victoria Green for a kill. It was a move Grand Rapids was not expecting.

"We had worked on that in practice. I was glad we were able to use it," Mitchell said.

Crystal Garmon had several kills and helped set up some nice kills for other players.
She too felt the team let up in the second game, but she also credited Grand Rapics wiht fighting back.
"They played better in the second game, and we started making a few mistakes," she said.

Freshman Victoria Green had some kills and blocks that helped stop comeback attempts by Grand Rapids.
"I wasn't very nervous. We all had a good game. There were a couple shots I would like to have back where they blocked me," she said.



Libero Jacey Sechrest felt relaxed and wasn't intimidated by the surroundings of a national championship tournament.
"We felt confident after the first game. We let up a little, but we were confident and we had a great game," she said.
she said she was a bit nervous at first, but settled down when she and the rest of the team were warming up.
She also felt confident after watching Grand Rapids warm up.
"Once you see a team warming up, you know what to expect," she added.