Gowanda Small Town Times

[photo] Gowanda’s Aubrie Heron (#9 blue) goes up on attack during the September 8 home game against Pine Valley.

The Gowanda High School gym was resurfaced over the Summer and just reopened for use. On September 8 the Gowanda Varsity girls volleyball team got the honor of being the first to use the redone gym as they hosted Pine Valley. While the two schools compete together in the Fall for football and soccer, this was an occasion to face off against each other. In what was a relatively easy win for Gowanda most of the regular starters sat out the third game of the match.

Gowanda started out fast with Holland Browning serving into a 3-0 lead. After a service miscue, Addison Kota added three additional service points putting Gowanda up 6-1. Pine Valley then went on a 4-point run narrowing the Gowanda lead to 6-5. Gowanda worked their way back to rebuild their lead to 18-8. From there Gowanda coasted to a 25-12 win. Closing that out, was Kota with four straight aces. One of those landed in the left corner of the court completely untouched.

Game 2 started out close as the score was tied at 1, 2 and 3. Then Gowanda made a gradual move into an 18-8 lead. Even play from there saw Gowanda take Game 2 by a 25-14 score. The final point came as a Pine Valley block at the net landed just wide of the court. With things seeming well in hand, Gowanda sat all of their starters except for Senior Ella Luther going into Game 3. Pine Valley grabbed the first two points in the game before Gowanda pulled back into a 3-all tie. With the help of a pair of Corrina John aces Gowanda built a 10-4 advantage. The score stood at 23-13 when Gowanda slipped into a slump. Pine Valley took the next eight points closing the gap to 23-21. At that point, Gowanda took a timeout to regroup and put two more of the regular starters into the game. It was enough for Gowanda to pull out a 25-22 game win taking a 3-0 victory in the match.

Top performances for the Gowanda girls included Addison Kota (5 kills, 6 aces, 5 digs), Holland Browning (3 kills, 3 aces, 6 digs), Aubrie Heron (5 kills) and Corrina John (3 kills, 4 aces). Providing strong support were Lauren Kelly (3 kills), Jillian Gernatt (1 kill, 2 aces, 3 digs), Elizabeth Green (1 kill, 2 digs), Ella Luther (14 digs, 1 ace) and Tessa John (2 aces, 3 digs).

Elsewhere in sports, Ellicottville was at Pine Valley/Gowanda for a Varsity girls soccer match. It was another disappointing day for Pine Valley falling behind 3-0 by halftime. Ellicottville added an additional point in the 2nd half for a 4-0 final score. It was a particularly easy day for the Ellicottville goaltender who did not face a single shot on goal during the game.