Eagles spike Ponies in finale

The Havre High volleyball team was looking to gain some momentum going into divisionals by upsetting arch rival Lewistown in the final match of the season. Yet, it wasn’t meant to be and the Eagles again showed why they are one of the top teams in all of Class A volleyball.

The Ponies struggled at the outset of the match and despite being more competitive as it wore on, were easily defeated by the Eagles on senior night Saturday in Lewistown by the scores of 25-12, 25-18 and 25-21.

“I thought that we played pretty well,” HHS head coach Melanie Skoyen said. “I thought that we played them a lot better than the score indicated. Our serve receive is what really hurt us. They served us tough and it made it difficult for us to get into our offense.”

Havre managed just four kills in the opening set of the match, two of which came from Dani Wagner as Lewistown opened the match with a 13-point win to take a 1-0 lead.

In the second game, the Ponies recovered from a poor start and notched 10 kills in a set that they ended up losing by seven, giving Lewistown a 2-0 advantage in the match.

Staring defeat in the face, Havre responded with its best set of the match. The Ponies got three kills from Jaycee McDonald and a total of three aces and took a 14-10 lead over the Eagles. But, in the end, Lewistown won the set 25-21 and swept Havre 3-0 to earn the victory and the No. 2 seed behind Belgrade in the Central A Divisional tournament which begins Nov.7 in Browning.

“We did play much better as the match went on,” Skoyen said. “We did a good job of attacking and even though we didn’t get a lot of kills, we didn’t hit a ton of balls out of bounds or into the net. I thought we played hard and if we can play like we did in the last game, I think we can do very well at divisionals.”

Dani Wagner led the way for Havre in defeat, notching seven kills, nine assists and six digs. Naomi Terry also had a solid match for the Ponies with five kill, seven assists and 10 digs. McDonald added four kills and one block for HHS, while Madison Huebsch had 12 digs and a pair of aces.

The loss drops the Ponies to 3-15 overall on the season and 2-6 in conference play, which is good enough for fourth place in the final Central A standings.

Havre will take the court again this Friday when the Ponies will square off against the Browning Indians in the opening game of the divisional tournament in Browning.

Lewistown def. Havre

25-12, 25-18, 25-21

Havre - Kills 23 (Dani Wagner 7, Naomi Terry 5, Jaycee McDonald 4); Assists 16 (Dani Wagner 9, Naomi Terry 7); Aces 4 (Samy Huston 2, Madison Huebsch 2); Digs 40 (Madison Huebch 12, Naomi Terry 10, Dani Wagner 6); Blocks 1 (Jaycee McDonald).