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Lady Bombers grab seventh straight CVC title
(by Tony Lange - October 19, 2011)
Lady Bombers grab seventh straight CVC title
By TONY LANGE
After 3-0 victories against Perry and Aurora last week, the Kenston volleyball team concluded its regular season with yet another Chagrin Valley Conference title. The Lady Bombers now have seven consecutive CVC championships.
Since rejoining the CVC in the fall of 2005, Kenston has not lost a conference volleyball match. Its current win streak is 90.
While 10-0 in conference action this year, the Lady Bombers were 1-7 during out-of-conference play finishing with an 11-7 overall record.
"This year was a little unique I would say in the fact that we've never had this many losses before," head coach Dan Coughlin said. "Our girls knew that we put together a schedule that wasn't going to make them successful right off the bat seeing how young we were and the level of teams we were playing against."
This year's varsity team includes two seniors, four juniors and six sophomores.
Starting in the front row for the Bombers are Jaime Kosiorek, sophomore, Alexis Taylor, junior, and Emily Newell, sophomore. In the back, serving is Taylor Curtis, sophomore, setting is Lori Zagar, sophomore, and left back is K.T. Coverdale, sophomore. Stephanie Bindernagel, sophomore, is the libero.
With such an inexperienced lineup, the Lady Bombers started their season with 3-0 losses against Toledo St. Ursula Academy, which is undefeated at 20-0, and Magnificat, 16-4. St. Ursula was ranked No. 1 in the state by the Ohio High School Volleyball Coaches Association on Oct. 9. Magnificat was ranked No. 4.
Other ranked teams the Lady Bombers faced this season were North Royalton, No. 12 in Division I, Bishop Hartley, No. 5 in Division II, Lake Catholic, No. 13 in Division II, Padua, No. 18 in Division II, and Gilmour Academy, No. 6 in Division III.
"I'm not going to weaken our schedule just to see our name in the polls or the newspaper," Coughlin said. "Our focus is on the state tournament, not getting our name in the top of the crop or being ranked in the top of the state."
With Kenston's five-game battle last Monday against Lake Catholic, the young Lady Bombers proved that they have improved since the season started and that they can compete with big teams, Coughlin said. Kenston took Lake Catholic into extra points, but came up short, 20-18, in the final game.
"Someone had to lose. It was a clean game by both teams," Coughlin said. "In the beginning of the year, we were a little sloppy with some unforced errors, while that was just a clean, fun game. It was just unfortunate that the ball fell their way."
Before Kenston's final regular season game against Aurora last Thursday, Coughlin said he was a little uneasy in how the game would play out because when the Bombers played Aurora earlier in the season, the Greenmen were without their senior standout Darby Griff.
Kenston, however, had no problems as the Bombers beat Aurora in three games, 25-19, 25-18 and 25-17.
"After that game, I told the kids, you know, we're ready," Coughlin said. "In the long run, now we're ready. We're ready for the postseason. When we play the game right, we play it better than any team in the state."
Kenston is seeded first of 12 teams in the Division I Solon District and is scheduled to play Shaker Heights 2:30 p.m. Saturday at Solon High School.
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