Laramie Volleyball Sweeps Cheyenne East

The Laramie High School volleyball team kicked off the second half of conference play with a three set win over Cheyenne East (25-20, 25-21, 25-15) in Laramie on Tuesday night. It marked the fourth time the teams have played each other this season, with Laramie winning every meeting.

The match got off to a slow start with both teams making hitting and service errors. Laramie was down 7-8 before Ali Beckler served seven points in a row, with one ace, to force an East timeout as the Lady Plainsmen were in the lead 15-8. East was not able to mount a comeback and Laramie closed out the first set by blocking East's 6'4" middle blocker, Jenna Heinonen, twice in the final three points.

Laramie Senior Josie Bowdish got her team off to a quick 4-0 start in the second set with her serving. But the Lady T-Birds fought back and the game tied up at 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 18 and 20 points. Once again, the experienced Lady Plainsmen squad showed they know how to finish and they quickly notched the five points needed with Brooke Hocker serving an ace to give set two to Laramie.

In the third set both teams upped their passing control and the neither team was able to pull away from the other through the first 11 points and most points were earned through either a kill or a block. But when East missed a serve to give Laramie the 12-11 lead the Lady Plainsmen ran away with the match. East used both their timeouts to stop the LHS serving run to no avail as Madison Legerski and Caitlin McInerney combined for big blocks to put Laramie ahead 18-11. Hitting errors would plague East the rest of the way and the match went to Laramie on a block by Bowdish and Britney Titensor.

With the win Laramie's overall records is 20-3 with a 5-1 conference mark. Outside hitters Laurel Austin and Ali Beckler led with 8 kills each while Austin added 20 digs and Beckler 2 aces. At the net Legerski had 7 block assists to go with her 5 kills and McInerney recorded 1 solo block, 4 block assists and 10 assists. As a team the Lady Plainsmen continued to serve aggressively with 6 aces.

Conference play will continue for LHS on Saturday at Cheyenne Central at 2:30 p.m.