Self-inflicted errors were prevalent in Tuesday’s District 5-AAA volleyball match at Ooltewah. Then again, in fairness to the Lady Owls and East Hamilton, the TSSAA season is two days old.
Ooltewah made more mistakes than coach Elaine Peigen wanted to see, but the Lady Hurricanes made more than her Lady Owls, who came away with a 3-0 victory. Set scores were 25-21, 25-17, 25-14.
“I’m glad to get our first district win under our belt, but we’ve got a long way to go before postseason,” said Peigen, who noted that players receiving serves that would’ve landed out of bounds and committing net violations were her team’s biggest problems. “I find myself fussing quite a bit.”
The game scores are a good illustration of Ooltewah’s improvement, or East Hamilton’s regression, throughout the course of the match. The Lady ‘Canes’ largest lead in the match was 4-2 in the first set. They never led in the second or third sets.
“We made a lot of mistakes,” East Hamilton coach Kristy Lenoir said. “Overall we’re a pretty young team. At times tonight we had three eighth-graders on the floor. That’s part of it. Part of it is taking ownership of our play.”