Marshall County drops match to unbeaten Ballard Memorial

Clara Bradley pushes the ball up and over Ballard Memorial blockers Kylee Bodell (26) and Shann0n Wilkins (9) in Thursday’s home game. The Lady Marshals fell 3-1 to the Lady Bombers.

Ballard Memorial is undefeated at 18-0 and have only dropped six sets to opponents this season,  two of those have come at the hands of the Lady Marshals. They opened the 2020 season with a 3-1 loss to the Lady Bombers and on Thursday, picked up their fifth loss of the season 3-1 (19-25, 25-21, 17-25, 15-25) to the top 20 ranked team.

“Ballard is a great team, and unfortunately, we made too many small mistakes”, Head Coach Laura Kinder said. “We really wanted this win, but we learned from it and will be better tomorrow.”

After winning the First Region All “A” Classic earlier this season, Ballard will begin play in the All “A” State Tournament at Eastern Kentucky University on Saturday.

The Lady Marshals took the early lead in the first set at 7-3 following a service ace by Halle Langhi. The Lady Bombers tied the game at 8-8 and took their first lead at 10-9. The Lady Marshals stayed within two to three points before a couple of net serves stretched the Lady Bombers lead out to 21-15 and they finished off the first set (25-19) with two kills from Bailey Lee and the game winner from Kinley Doublin.

Marshall County took control early again in the second set, leading 7-3 then 10-6 before two straight kills by Isabella Myers cut their lead to 11-9. A kill by Langhi and tip by Alyssa McClain put the Lady Marshals back up 14-11. Lee on a kill tied the game at 16 all but the second set belonged to the Lady Marshals with more kills coming from Tori McCracken, Clara Bradley and Langhi to finish out the 25-21 win.

Ballard led most of set three, taking an eight point lead at 18-10. Langhi found a hole to cut the lead down to six points at 21-15 but the Lady Bombers rolled on to take the set 25-11, finishing it off with another winner by Doublin.

The Lady Marshals fell behind 6-2 in the fourth set, cut to 6-4 on a hit by ace by Langhi. The Lady Bombers lead stretched out to 13-6 in part on some miss hits by the Lady Marshals. Trailing 20-13, Bradley tipped to open spots twice on the Ballard side to cut the lead to five points but from there, the Lady Bombers scored the next five to close out the set 25-15 and the 3-1 win.

Coach Kinder said she was pleased with improvements she saw in blocking, “especially by Ashley, Alyssa and Tori and Clara played excellent defense.”

The JV Lady Marshals continued their unbeaten season with a 2-1 win over Ballard Memorial.

Stats for the Lady Marshals:
Halle Langhi: 17 kills, 11 digs, 4 aces
Alyssa McClain: 6 kills, 1 block
Tori McCracken: 3 kills, 2 blocks, 3 digs
Clara Bradley: 10 kills, 25 digs
Ashley Bremmerkamp: 2 blocks, 12 digs
Peyton Gresham: 31 assists
Bailey Pritchett: 16 digs
Record: 9-5

Marshall County has three games left on the regular season schedule before district tournament play and it starts with a 9:00 a.m. Saturday morning game at Henderson County.

Ashley Bremmerkamp (9) picks up the serve from Ballard Memorial in the second set. The Lady Marshals won set two 25-21.
Bailey Pritchett serving in the second set against Ballard Memorial.