HHS spikers make progress

The Havre High volleyball team had a solid second weekend on the court, and even though it didn’t find itself in the win column much over the weekend in Great Falls, the Blue Ponies again took a step forward.

On the opening day of the Electric City Classic in Great Falls, the Ponies posted a 1-5-1 record on the first day of pool play, Then, the Ponies lost two of three matches in the consolation bracket of the tournament Saturday.

“We got our serve going a lot better in this tournament than we did last week,” HHS head coach Tamecia Jarvis said. “We improved a lot, our passing was better and also our hustle was really good. We didn’t let any balls hit the floor and we got a lot if compliments from other coaches about how scrappy we were.”

On the first day of the tournament in pool play, the Pones got things started with a loss in two games to Great Falls High by the scores of 20-13, 20-14. Then, Havre earned a split with Billings West, winning the first game 20-19 and dropping the second 17-20.

The Ponies then lost consecutive matches to Missoula Big Sky, by the scores of 20-18, 20-18, and Helena Capital by the scores 20-6 and 20-11. But the Ponies did get a win Friday by knocking off Butte High 20-18 and 20-19.

However, HHS finished the day with consecutive losses to Billings Skyview (20-6, 20-11) and Glacier (20-6, 20-9). Yet, despite winning just once in seven matches, the fact that they all came against Class AA schools means that Havre has nothing to be ashamed of.

“I think that we did a lot of good things, we did a lot better with our team play, and I think that we kept up with a lot of these good teams,” Jarvis said. “One thing that we need to work on is our hitting errors, we didn’t hit the ball, so we need to do a better job of that.”

On Saturday in the consolation bracket, the Ponies opened up with CMR and the Rustlers dispatched of HHS by winning 2-1. Havre took the first game 25-22, but fell in the next 25-18 and 15-13 in the third and deciding game.

Next, the Ponies found themselves matched up against fellow Central A member Lewistown. HHS lost the first game 25-19, but evened the match by winning the second game 25-15, before winning the match via a 15-13 win in game three.

Yet, the Ponies would be eliminated in the very next round of the consolation tournament as HHS fell to Missoula Hellgate with back-to-back 25-16 victories.

“We are busting our butts and getting everything up off the floor,” Jarvis said. “We are doing the hard things like that. We just need to do some of the easy things better like hitting. We were hitting some balls out and not close but way out. So, we just need to get some more consistency when we play teams like these.”

Havre will be back on the court tonight when they head to Conrad. Then they will play both Hardin and Laurel in Lewistown Saturday.