CULVER | After losing the first two games of Tuesday's Class A Culver Community Sectional opener, South Central coach Ashley Rinker told her team not to give up.
The Satellites did their best not to, but they lost to Triton 25-23, 25-19, 25-22.
“I told them to believe in yourselves and make it a promise to your team and yourselves that whatever happens you’re not going to give up,” Rinker said. “There were points where we saw that, where they weren’t giving up, but they just couldn’t handle it.”
Down 13-8 in Game 3, the Satellites went on a 7-2 run to tie the game at 15-15 after a Cassie Hunsley ace. Briana Satoski had back-to-back kills to put South Central up 17-15, but Triton answered with a 4-1 run to take a two-point lead.
“Briana has always been our big hitter,” Rinker said. “It seemed like we lost a lot of momentum when she went to the back row, because she’s the one that can get an immediate kill. The other players have good control and can keep the ball in play, but she’s the only one that seemed be able to get us an immediate kill, which is what we needed."
South Central went on a 3-1 run to tie the game at 20-20. Triton ended the game on a 5-2 run, capped off by a Shana Anderson kill. Anderson led the Trojans with 12 kills.
“I think at times our communication was lacking (during Game 3), because we had been looking forward to this game for so long,” Triton coach Samantha Keel said.
The Trojans were beaten by the Satellites in a tournament earlier this season.
“For them to come back and not want to lose that third game was huge for our team,” Keel said.
Satoski led the Satellites with 15 kills, while Kaitlyn Jackson added eight.
“Its been typical of our season,” Rinker said. “We weren’t hustling enough, and we didn’t play every point out, and that’s been our season. We don’t play the entire point or entire rally, and that was just lazy.“
In Game 1, South Central was down 20-17, but went on a 3-1 to tie the game at 20-20. Triton took a 23-21 lead on a Breanna Lemler block and went on to win 25-23.
Game 2 saw the Satellites take a 4-0 lead, but the Trojans went on a 9-4 run to go up 9-8. South Central tied the game at 13-13, before Triton pulled away.
“(We weren’t) being urgent and not wanting to get to 25,” Rinker said. “It just seemed like we didn’t want to play and looked lazy, which is disappointing knowing that this was potentially their last match, and it was.”
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