Clermont County’s two Eastern Cincinnati Conference volleyball programs met on the court last week.
The Milford Lady Eagles hosted West Clermont’s Lady Wolves, picking up a 3-1 win (22-25, 25-15, 25-15, 25-19) in the process.
West Clermont head coach Melissa Downs said the Lady Wolves knew what they had to do in the game to get the victory over Milford.
“We’re scrappy,” Downs said. “We’re not very tall, so we’re going to have to play a lot of defense and play smart. The girls are stepping up to that.”
West Clermont took the first set off the Lady Eagles, marking the third straight contest between the two programs that has gone four sets. Downs said the team’s energy level was key to the success in that set.
“Lot of energy,” Downs said. “Our energy was high, we worked together as a team. We were playing smart together.”
A little further down the sideline, Milford head coach Amy Gill attributed her team’s slow start to a lack of familiarity with some players due to injury.
”We had three kids on varsity injured,” Gill said. “We had a hamstring injury on our starting outside, an elbow injury on our starting middle. We really had to scramble to get ready for today, but the kids did a great job.”
Gill continued, noting once the team sorted through the changes they were able to take control of the match.
“We started to execute a little better,” Gill said. “I think that first set was us just getting used to people in new places. We had to get a little more comfortable, and we started doing a better job of executing.”
Around that same time, West Clermont’s passing began to deteriorate, which in turn affected the rest of the team’s game, according to Downs.
“We started to go down a little bit with our passing.” Downs said. “We started struggling a bit in our passing, and it started to loosen our confidence.”
Statistically, Kimmie Lanham led West Clermont with 20 assists. Emme Madden added 15, 12 kills and 19 digs. Hannah Graves recorded 18 digs, with Emma Southall adding 16.
Milford’s Julia Gill recorded a team-high 23 assists. Emily Morgan led the team with 21 digs, and Logan Downs added three blocks.
Milford also totaled 13 aces as a team, led by Sara Geise’s six. Serving was one of the team’s strengths, according to Coach Amy Gill.
“I thought we served well,” Gill said. “I think in that third set we had something like seven aces. We had some strong blocking and we played some great defense, reading shots and picking stuff up.”
Both teams returned to action two days later with wins. Milford swept Farifield 25-14, 25-14, 25-22, while West Clermont picked up a five-set win over Oak Hills (14-25, 29-25, 25-14, 25-12, 15-9).
The teams are scheduled to continue league play on Thursday, September 3. West Clermont is slated to visit Turpin, while Milford hosts Loveland. Both games are scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m.