Garden City Spikes Seward in Five Sets

Seward County competed in one of the top rivalry games of the week as they made a trip down the road to Garden City where they faced the Broncbusters in an instant classic as the Lady Saints found themselves backed into a corner before charging back to force a fifth set but eventually fell to in five-sets 3-2 against their Jayhawk rival.

Set one was as close as they get with Garden City taking an early lead until a 3-0 run by Seward County led by a block at the pin from Keala Wilson and Lajla Rasljanin locked the score up at 5-5. Both sides continued to exchange blows with Ana Nikolic making her return from injury known by connecting on a powerful kill to keep SCCC within reach of the Broncbusters who managed to put enough points together for a 22-18 lead and force the Lady Saints into a timeout. Mariana Silva slammed home a kill from the pin while Rasljanin fired in an ace to force set one into extra points with Garden City being the team to be the first to gain a two-point lead and win the first 26-24.

The Broncbuster’s momentum carried over into the second set as Seward County fell behind with a 7-2 run by Garden City to open the set two. Silva helped to close the gap with another big kill to add to SCCC’s total while Marcelina Pyka added on with a spike down the middle of her own before Rasljanin sunk in back-to-back aces to make it a one-point difference as the Lady Saints slashed the Broncbuster’s lead down to 12-11. Seward County found themselves in control over the next ten points as Silva’s barrage of kills helped turn the Lady Saints’ one-point deficit into a one-point lead at 21-20. Despite a strong run to take over the set with a final push from Garden City put Seward County on the sour end of a 5-2 run to hand the Broncbusters set two 25-23 and a 2-0 set lead.

Backed into a corner the Lady Saints opened the third set with a 7-3 run led by a hammer down the middle form Rasljanin who then combined with Silva for an emphatic block to force Garden City into a timeout. The Broncbusters once again added a scoring run to retake the lead 21-15 before an 8-0 run by SCCC off a pair of aces from Wilson helped put Seward County back in front 23-21. Once again, the Lady Saints forced extra points but were on the right side this time around with a kill from Nikolic silencing the crowd and clinching set three 26-24 for Seward County.

With momentum firmly in their favor, the Lady Saints continued to stay strong against their Jayhawk rivals with Nikolic and Silva beginning set four with another pair of kills to put SCCC up 9-6. Silva continued to add to her kill total with a barrage from all over the court to stretch her team’s lead out to 21-14 before quickly wrapping up the fourth 25-18 with Rasljanin sending a rocket through the heart of the Broncbusters to force a fifth and final set.

Despite finding their rhythm in the third and fourth sets, the Lady Saints struggled to find that same success in the fifth as Garden City sprung ahead with a 6-2 advantage. Seward County created a late scoring run with Pyka springing up in the middle of the net for a monster kill with Rasljanin dropping in another ace for her team to trim the gap to 12-8 before the Broncbusters finished off the match by taking down the Lady Saints 15-9.

Seward County now falls to 6-12 overall on the 2024 campaign while dropping to 2-6 in Jayhawk conference action. The Lady Saints will find themselves on the road in five of their next six games with their next matchup sending them to Cloud County to take on the T-Birds at 6:30 PM on October 9^th.