The Gilmer High Lady Cats were busy in their first week of volleyball action.
GHS made the short trip to Pickens last Tuesday for three matches. Fannin County was up first, and the Lady Rebels defeated the Cats in straight sets. Gilmer bounced back to defeat Woodland by the same margin before a 2-0 loss to the host Dragonettes.
Gilmer hit the road for Hall County two days later. The North Hall Trojans toppled the Cats in two sets. GHS ended its day against Flowery Branch, and the Falcons came away with a 2-1 victory.
There may have been some nerves at play when Gilmer opened its season versus Fannin. Three current Gilmer starters previously played at FCHS, and the Cats never threatened in a 25-17, 25-8 loss.
GHS got on track in its next match versus Woodland and cruised to set wins of 25-14 and 25-15. Much like the Fannin match, the one against Pickens saw the Cats fall further behind in the second set. The Dragonettes took the match with wins of 25-15 and 25-9.
“Starting out against Fannin probably wasn’t a good idea, but I don’t have any say in that,” said GHS head coach Maria Huelsman. “We have three players who played at Fannin, and I think that gave some nerves to the girls. It might have been a better story if we played them in the third match, because we didn’t play Pickens bad. I don’t want to make excuses for anything because we just didn’t play well, period.”
North Hall was able to defeat the Cats by scores of 25-20 and 25-11. While Gilmer earned a commanding 25-12 win over Flowery Branch in set two, the Falcons won the first and third by respective scores of 25-22 and 15-12.
“I was happy with everybody’s play on Thursday,” Huelsman said. “It was a totally different team. I think that first match (versus Fannin) was just first-day jitters. On Thursday, they played hard and fought the whole entire time. Nothing was easy for either one of those teams to put us away.”
Versus Flowery Branch, Lady Cats Madison Bradshaw and Jace Sanderson finished with four kills apiece and each tallied six assists. Caylee Elrod and Lilyan Cook were credited with one kill. Maddie Usry and Bradshaw also had six digs, Aliza Chastain had four and Grace Bramlett three.
The Cats have a 1-4 record and returned to the court at Tuesday’s press deadline against Dawson County and Dalton.
“Dalton was pretty strong last year and we lost to Dawson in three sets every time we played them,” Huelsman said. “We were in the same region with Dawson last year, and I’m expecting it to be good matches.”
Pickens and Rome high schools will be in Ellijay Thursday for matches starting at 5 p.m. Gilmer will head to Chestatee Saturday for four matches, and the schedule has yet to be determined.