Wednesday, Sep. 16, 2009

Southridge stuffs Ike

By Rene Ferran, Herald staff writer

A year ago, Meagan Doyle was Southridge's "other" middle blocker, the one opposite all-stater Liz Clark.

Nowadays, Clark plays for Lewis-Clark State, and Doyle is enjoying her senior year and an increased role in the Suns attack.

Doyle had nine kills, four aces and two blocks Tuesday night, helping lead Southridge to a 25-22, 25-13, 25-20 CBBN home win over Eisenhower.

"I always looked up to Liz," Doyle said. "She helped me a lot, and I'm trying to follow in her footsteps. It's my turn now in the spotlight."

With Doyle and sophomore Shelby Warner (nine kills, four blocks) dominating the middle of the court, the Suns needed only 70 minutes to dispose of an Ike team that had ended Kamiakin's 32-match league winning streak Thursday.

With his Suns entering a stretch of five matches in eight days, including a showdown with fellow unbeaten Richland at home on Saturday, John Lengphounpraseut was happy to see his team get off to a strong start.

"I'm proud of the way the girls stood up and believed they could pull this one out," he said. "Meagan played a smart game tonight, and Shelby is just a sophomore who had a great club season. She'll be another surprise to a lot of teams."

A bigger surprise might have been Ike's sloppiness throughout the match. The Cadets were called for six rotation errors and had 14 hitting and nine service errors.

"That was just a lack of focus," said Ike coach Brad Ackerman, shaking his head at the number of rotation errors, which happen when a player is standing in the wrong spot at the time of service.

"We had a big win over Kamiakin which should have given us confidence, but then we come out and lay an egg like this."

The first set was back-and-forth, with Ike leading 15-14 after a Tori Fisher kill, but back-to-back kills by Doyle gave Southridge a slim lead it nursed to the finish.

Doyle then had a big service run to open the second set, with three aces during a seven-point stretch capped by a Warner block.

Warner then combined with Jamie Lyons on two more blocks during a four-point run served by Andrea Smith that gave Southridge a 13-3 lead.

"It was really good for us to start out strong against them," Doyle said. "We had it in the back of our minds (that Ike beat Kamiakin), and it was good to beat them in three."

To do that, the Suns had to escape one final Ike surge late in the third set that saw the Cadets close a seven-point deficit to 18-17.

"I knew they'd give us a fight in that third set," Lengphounpraseut said. "This was a good win for us."

Heather Worley also had nine kills and five aces for Southridge, while Smith had 28 assists. Fisher had a match-high 12 kills for Ike.