Richard Anderson photo
The Cowgirls celebrate a point Friday morning in the tough five-game win over Montana State in the UniWyo Cowgirl Invite.
By Richard Anderson
Wyoming Sports.org
Dani Bedore has been there before and so were the Cowgirls last season: In a five-game match.
Last season, though, the Cowgirls were 0-7 in those five-setters. Early on this season, they are 1-0 after stopping Montana State in five, 25-17, 25-19, 24-26, 26-15 and 15-11 Friday in the first match of the UniWyo Cowgirl Invite.
Later on Friday, the Cowgirls, 4-1, beat North Dakota in four games, 25-22, 21-25, 25-18 and 25-23.
“I’m really pleased with the girls staying focus; they never quit,” Wyoming coach Carrie Yerty said of the team's win over Montana State. “They continued to work hard. When push came to shove, they did a nice job of terminating. They did a nice job of blocking and they stayed aggressive, which was huge.”
Bedore, the team’s leading hitter last season as a sophomore, hadn’t put up the same type of numbers through the first three matches, but took over in game five on Friday. Bedore had five kills and a big serving ace in that fifth game to lead the Cowgirls to the close win.
While Bedore was the big hitter in the final game, she deflected the credit to the rest of her junior teammates -- Lauren Whitney and JennaRae Jester -- who also came up big in the match.
“It’s the attitude that all of our veterans have today,” Bedore said. “It was tight in the game, we just had to go through and lead.”
“It’s the attitude that all of our veterans have today,” Bedore said. “It was tight in the game, we just had to go through and lead.”
Yerty, however, didn’t hesitate to say that Bedore’s play gave them a lift. Up until that fifth game, the Cowgirls seemed to be in trouble after easily winning the first two games.
“I think that Dani Bedore did a great job of establishing the offense for us when your passing broke down,” Yerty said.
Wyoming hit over .300 in the first two games, but could manage a .128 and .189 hitting percentage in the next two sets, which Montana State took advantage of.
“Any time you have a young team like we do, you’re going to have some ups and downs,” Yerty said. “The girls really competed hard. They started off aggressive in that fifth game and that is a game where you want that to go after it with the most aggressive play you have.”
It came down to that fifth game and Wyoming jumped out to a quick 6-2 lead. Montana State battled back to make it 7-7, but it was UW the rest of the way, led by Bedore.
“I feel like we have a lot of fire, but we are just out there to win, and everybody knows that we should win this game. We just have ore confidence in ourselves,” said Bedore, who finished with 15 kills and 10 digs. “We really just came together. We had to work through the little things that weren’t going right for us. We just pulled together.”
Whitney led the Cowgirls with 16 kills, with freshman Jodi Purdy adding 10 kills and 14 digs. Her final kill closed the match.
Jester had a big match as well, with 12 kills and eight blocks. Setter Barbara Lasic finished with 49 assists in the match.
“For our team to be good, we have to have a balanced offense,” Yerty said. “Barbara, our setter, can do a nice job of running the offense. We should have enough weapons and keep teams off balance. Hopefully, you always have a number of teams in double digits."
Kyla Hendry led the Bobcats with 14 kills and Jodeen Rademacher added 10 kills. Sophomore Lauren Curtis, who played sparingly for Wyoming last season, added nine kills for the Bobcats.
Against North Dakota, two Cowgirls finished the night with double figures in kills led by Purdy, whi finished with a career-high 18 kills and 15 digs. Whitney followed with 14 kills, while Jessica Kagarise recorded 19 digs.
North Dakota was led by Devin Trefz who had 12 kills and eight digs. Britta Hanson followed with ten kills and 12 block assists.
“I thought we did a better job of going back and forth scoring and not letting them get big runs on us,” Yerty said. “We stayed aggressive the entire match. Jodi had a tremendous match tonight. We need to continue to get our middles going, but overall they competed and they battled. It was a total team effort.”
Wyoming will close out the tournament against Fresno State Saturday at 7 p.m.
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COWGIRLS 3, BOBCATS 2
(Kills, Assists, Digs, Blocks)
MONTANA STATE: Rachelle Allen 5 1 12 0, Taylor Faught 4 43 4 2, Kylie Edinger 3 0 1 2, Taylar Barney 8 0 9 4, Kyla Hendry 14 0 1 4, Lauren Curtis 9 0 1 0, Nicole Grypiuk 3 0 1 0, Jodeen Rademacher 10 2 6 1, Chelsea Oemcke 0 0 0 0, Jennifer Lindquist 0 1 0 0, Meghan Albiston 0 2 13 0, Hannah Stroebe 0 0 4 0. Totals: 56 49 52 13.
WYOMING: Dani Bedore 15 2 10 1, Lauren Whitney 16 0 5 3, Jodi Purdy 10 2 14 2, Barbara Lasic 0 49 3 4, JennaRae Jester 12 0 2 8 Camille Coffman 2 0 0 4, Nikky Sapp 0 0 0 0, Jessica Kagarise 0 0 9 0, Brianna Crowe 0 0 1 0, Jadranka Tramosljanin 1 1 9 0, Makenzie Bartsch 0 0 0 0. Totals: 56, 54, 53 22.
Montana State 17 19 26 25 11 -- 2
Wyoming 25 25 24 15 15 -- 3
Attendance -- 149. Time -- 2:03.
COWGIRLS 3, FIGHTING SIOUX 1
(Kills, Assists, Digs, Blocks)
NORTH DAKOTA: Courtney Halvorson 0 1 5 0, Anikka Snead 9 0 10 3, Amanda Polzin 8 0 2 4, Devin Trefz 12 0 8 5, Megan Langseth 2 40 6 3, Britta Hanson 10 0 2 12, Lindsay Vortherms 1 0 21 0, Taylor Bohannon 0 0 1 0, Erin Jokj 5 0 1 6, Julie Paradine 0 0 0 0. Totals: 47 42 56 33.
WYOMING: Dani Bedore 6 3 6 0, Lauren Whitney 14 0 5 3, Jodi Purdy 18 1 15 1, Barbara Lasic 4 43 4 0, JennaRae Jester 5 0 3 1, Camille Coffman 6 0 1 4, Jessica Kagarise 0 0 19 0, Jadranka Tramosljanin 0 0 8 0, Makenzie Bartsch 0 0 0 0. Totals: 53 47 61 9.
North Dakota 22 25 18 23 -- 1
Wyoming 25 21 25 25 -- 3
Attendance -- 528. Time -- 2:09.
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