The Lakers volleyball team continued in the Sonny Lewis Volleyball Tournament today by facing the Hagerstown Hawks and the St. Clair County Skippers.  Against the Hawks, the Lakers dropped the first two games of the match 25-17 and 25-19. The highly competitive matches saw the Lakers battling as they put together some great swings and blocks. Lakeland gained some momentum toward the end of game 2 and used is to take games 3 and 4 by the scores of 25-20 and 25-22. Sydney Park was having great offensive games while Alyssa Lino and Taylor Williams-Stevens played well at the net with several blocks. In the 5th game, the Lakers made a couple of mistakes serving and had some errors on defense that enabled the Hawks to take the game, 15-10. In game 2 against the Skippers, the Lakers faced a very strong team. Lakeland worked hard and battled in each game, but in the end, they were unable to match up as they fell 3-0 (25-13, 25-16, 25-15).

Against the Hawks, Sydney Park was exceptionally strong as she finished with 21 kills and 26 digs. Alyssa Lino also had a strong game with 10 kills and 7 blocks while Taylor Williams-Stevens added 7 kills and 7 blocks. Zoe Babnik had a team high 40 digs while Gianna Biondolillo and Abby Karasek each recorded 31 digs. Mikayla Polefko also chipped in a kill and 2 digs in the loss. 

Against the Skippers, Taylor Williams-Stevens had a strong game finishing with 10 kills and 5 blocks. Alyssa Lino had 4 kills and 2 blocks while Zoe Babnik finished with 42 digs. Abby Karasek had a strong all-around game with 4 kills, 25 digs, and a block while Samantha Winter continued her strong play as setter and also kicked in 7 digs. Gianna Biondolillo recorded 3 kills and 10 digs while Ashlen Horowski picked up 11 digs.

Coach Watts' Word: "This was a tough weekend in terms of wins and losses; however, we saw some very good teams that really challenged us. We saw a lot of growth over the weekend that I believe shows that we can compete with most everyone when we have our confidence and play our game. We have some areas that we need to clean up - our serving needs to be more consistent and we need to do better overall defensively, but the abilities are there. We will keep working hard and enjoy a little reprieve before we kick off our league schedule."

Player of the Game: Sydney Park

Next Up:  The Lakers will have a little break in their scheduled before they play host to the Cuyahoga Triceratops on Wednesday, Sept. 10. Game time is at 6:00 pm in Laker Gym.