MCC Volleyball wins home-opener over Saints

MCC won 28-26, 25-21, 23-25 and 26-24.

“I thought we did O.K. for our first match, we have a lot of little things we need to fix,” said MCC Coach Hayley Kobza.

The coach said Thursday’s match was only the fourth time this group of players had played together.

“We put this group together late in the preseason, maybe we should have done that earlier, but we were battling out differences and identifying which players played the best in different areas.

No official statistics were available for this match, but Kobza cited 6-1 freshman middle/outside Relebohile Phamoste (Maseru, Lesotho) for

“I thought ‘Relo’ did a nice job today coming in and just getting to work,” said Kobza. “She’s a strong freshman and a strong player who can come in a do a lot of different things all across the net.”

The coach said coming into the season she thought serving would be a strong aspect of the team.

“But tonight we didn’t show that so I’m really excited to see what they can do after the nerves are gone, and what that looks like when we get stronger from the serving line,” said Kobza.

Sophomore setter Zoe Mulholland (Lander, Wyo.) was not with the team Thursday because of family obligations so freshman Cheyanne Ortiz (Pueblo, Colo.) got the start.

“I thought Cheyanne came in and really handled the court really well for a freshman and she didn’t let that pressure affect her at all and she also served really well and smart in some key situations,” said Kobza.

Freshman libero Paula Urizar (Guatemala City, Guatemala) also got to start her first collegiate match.

“I thought she was very nervous in a few spots and we had to have a little pep talk and she responded well and didn’t seem to dwell on the errors,”

MCC, 1-0, will continue play in the North Platte Community College Tournament Friday and Saturday in North Platte with the Lady Indians taking on Laramie County Community College Friday at 11 a.m. and at 4 p.m. against Cloud County Community College. On Saturday MCC will play Colorado Northwestern CC.

Up-to-date information about MCC volleyball including up-to-date schedule and changes, livestream links for home games, rosters, photos, statistics and more can be found on the MCC Athletics website, www.mccindians.com