Owensboro Catholic beat Owensboro 3-0 (25-18, 25-15, 25-16) to retain the 9th District Championship. Owensboro’s own Addie Travis was named this year’s 9th District Player of the Year. Both teams also had multiple players named to the 9th District All-Tournament Team. The All-Tournament team included:
- Kayla Jones- DCHS
- Kennedy Murphy- OCHS
- Kiersten Taylor- OHS
- Kelsey Dickinson- AHS
- Chase Mathers- OHS
- Ava Fincher- OHS
- Jennifer Lee- AHS
- Blair Riney- OCHS
- Ava Fazio- AHS
The venue was filled with fans rooting for both teams. The student sections for both teams were key in making the atmosphere one fit for a postseason championship. The thunderous and uplifting cheers is what hyped up the Lady Aces, according to head coach Brian Hardison.
“The girls came out and they were hyped,” he said. “They came here at 4 o’clock, and that was their idea. Our fan base made the difference between tonight and last time. When they left the last time, we lost three. I said to the fans y’all got to at least stay through it.”
Both teams came ready to play as they went point for point to start the match off. The Lady Aces forced OHS to make mistakes that would give them an 11-6 lead early in the first set.
The Lady Red Devils built up momentum and tied the set at 13-13. Some errors saw them drop behind again at 17-14. For OHS, the game was plagued with uncharacteristic small errors and mistakes, according to OHS head coach Melissa Hibbs.
“Tonight we made a lot of uncharacteristic and unforced errors that you can’t make against a good team,” she said. “We just couldn’t get our offense going, but I thought our hustle and our heart was there, so I don’t think we have anything to hang our heads about today.”
The Lady Aces used their momentum to win the first set 25-18.
OCHS started the first set off with the upper hand as they had a 13-7 lead. They started to pull away as they didn’t make it easy for OHS to get many returns. The Lady Red Devils offense managed to cut the lead, but couldn’t string together enough points to stop OCHS from taking the second set 25-15.
With the series at 2-0, Owensboro kept it close starting out with the score at 8-7, and neither team let the other get too much of a lead. This persisted until Owensboro Catholic began to overwhelm OHS and extended the lead to 17-12. The Lady Aces gave them no opportunity to claw back, and they closed out the final set 25-16.
Owensboro closed out their first district championship with a hard fought battle. Hibbs said the girls’ performance was a testament to how far the program has come, and they are ready to continue into the postseason at regionals.
“I feel like in the past we’ve had a lot of great teams, and we’ve had a lot of athletic teams and a lot of girls who have made those strides, but we just couldn’t get over that hump,” she said. “I think this year we really developed the culture of playing for each other even more. We developed the confidence within ourselves, and then developed it within our team. We are just going to get hungry from tonight and go to practice tomorrow and work because our season’s not over. We’re ready to go next week.”
After winning their second district title in a row, Hardison said he was proud of the performance by the Lady Aces as it showed how far the team had come this season.
“It means that we’ve come a long way,” he said. “It started out a little slow, started picking it up about midway and we kept going and kept going. We wanted to be undefeated in district, but Owensboro made sure we didn’t. For us to climb back and come in to take the district title is huge for these young ladies. What we focused on was everything we do, it’s as a team. We have no individuals. Individuals don’t win games, teams do, and I think they played pretty well as a team.”
The Lady Aces and the Lady Red Devils will continue their seasons in the 3rd Region Tournament next week.
