No. 15 'Hounds win 9th straight

Fort Scott Community College's volleyball team extended its winning streak to nine matches Wednesday night after beating Coffeyville 3 sets to 1 in Jayhawk Conference-Eastern Division play. Match scores were 25-19, 25-13, 19-25, 25-12.

The Greyhounds, who haven't lost since losing in 5 sets to Division I school Paris, Texas, in a tournament in Vernon, Texas, on Aug. 30, improved to 2-1 in the East and 15-2 overall. On Tuesday, Fort Scott was put into the No. 15 slot in the NJCAA Division II Volleyball Poll. The 'Hounds are one of four ranked Jayhawk teams with Johnson County at No. 4, Kansas City Kansas No. 5 and defending Division II national champion Cowley at No. 11.

Fort Scott was led by KJCCC East Player of the Week Julia Stringer, who had 16 kills in the match. Stringer, a 5' 10" freshman right-side/outside hitter, was honored for recording double-figure numbers in kills in four of five matches last week, which included a victory over Des Moines Area at a tournament in Marshalltown, Iowa. DMACC was ranked No. 13 in Division II at the time. She had a .453 hitting percentage (ratio of successful attacks to attempts) for the week and is leading the division in hitting percentage.

It was the third straight week FSCC had a player named as an Eastern Division POTW. Libero Terina Harris had received Defensive Player of the Week honors the previous two weeks.

The 'Hounds had some trouble getting started at the beginning of the match as Coffeyville (1-3, 9-6) took a 4-0 lead and managed to stay even with FSCC for quite a while afterwards. Fort Scott began to pull away as Molly Hothan and Brandi Huesman began to provide some additional support up front. Sheri Middleton scored the last 2 points for the 'Hounds as they went up one set to none.

The second set started with a 6-0 run for the Greyhounds and they eventually led 19-8. Middleton again had the last kill of the match as the Red Ravens were never able to score more than 3 points in a row at any time.

The third set was tied 12-12 before Coffeyville went on a 6-1 run that gave them control. But then the 'Hounds dominated most of the fourth set, going up 11-1 and then 16-2. It was 18-4 before Coffeyville finally scored its first point while it held serve and was able to score four in a row.

A Stringer kill gave Fort Scott the serve back at 24-12 and a Coffeyville error concluded the match.

Hothan added 11 kills for the Greyhounds while Middleton, Huseman and Shelbey Baker each had 7. Kortney Blaufuss handed out 43 assists. Harris had 12 digs and Emily Bruce had 9.

Fort Scott plays in the Allen Tournament today and Saturday in Iola. The Greyhounds will play four matches.