Box Score EL DORADO, Kan. – Opening Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference play on the road against defending conference champion and number-five nationally ranked Butler Community College, the Cloud County Community College volleyball team would see a pair of 25-23 defeats in the opening two sets of the match come as part of a 3-0 defeat inside the Power Plant in El Dorado, Kansas on Wednesday, August 24th.
A fourth-straight road match to start the season saw the third set finish as a 25-18 defeat for the T-Birds who now fall to 3-2 overall and 0-1 in the KJCCC while the Grizzlies pick up their first win of the year to improve to 1-4 overall and 1-0 in conference play after starting their season with four matches against top-20 ranked foes.
Late runs by Butler in each of the three sets would prove to be the biggest difference in the match as the Grizzlies would pull away late in the opening set and go up 24-20 before seeing CCCC fend off three consecutive set points to try and force extra points before seeing a kill from Ivy Fink to end the set. Cloud County would open the second set with a strong start to jump out to an early lead on BCC midway through the set but playing at home would prove advantageous for Butler and allow the Grizzlies to tie things up at 23-23 and eventually score the final two points of the set to hand the T-Birds a second-straight two-point defeat. With momentum flipped completely in favor of Butler heading into the third set, BCC would put their foot on the pedal to get out to a five-point lead early on and never look back as Cloud County would never be able to recover and drop their second-straight match after opening the season with three consecutive wins.
Offensively,
Kenzie Cooper would lead the T-Birds with six total kills as CCCC was held to a total of 19 kills on the evening and a .087 attack percentage.
Katelynn Brogan would record a team-high 16 digs which included six digs in each of the first two sets to go along with a team-best nine set assists to finish one assist shy of a double-double despite being held to a season-low two kills. Sophomore
Camryn Wessel would record two of CCCC's three solo blocks to finish with a team-best two blocks as the T-Birds recorded just four blocks in match.
What's Next?
Cloud County will have a week off to regroup and prepare for their 2022 home opening match when they play host to Colby Community College at 6:30 PM on Wednesday, August 31st. At the time of this release, Colby heading to a decisive fifth set with number-17 ranked Seward County in their KJCCC opening match in Colby. The Trojans went a perfect 4-0 on the opening weekend of play at the Southeast Community College RKP Invitational which included two three-set sweeps against opponents while winning their other two matches in four sets and five sets, respectively.
