Gowanda Small Town Times

On Friday, October 6, the Gowanda Varsity football team lost a golden opportunity to showoff in front of the home crowd. A scheduled game with St. Mary’s was cancelled. St. Mary’s had only played twice this season giving up 115 points without scoring a single point themselves. While the fans missed seeing quite a show by the Gowanda team they also avoided the rain that would have been a part of the second half.

Shortly before the original start time for the football game, the Gowanda Varsity girls volleyball team was starting play at Lake Shore in a non-league match-up. One thing that has been a strong point for the Gowanda team is their ability to outlast the competition in matches that are extended past the minimum three games. Gowanda had previously been involved in three 5-game matches, winning two of those with the one loss coming on the first game of the season. The ability to stay strong while the competition wears out served Gowanda well again at Lake Shore.

In Game 1, Lake Shore started fast grabbing an early 5-1 lead. That continued to grow through a 20-10 advantage to a 25-13 Lake Shore win. Gowanda rebounded in Game 2 taking four of the first five points. Lake Shore came back to tie the game at 5 and move into a brief 7-5 lead. Gowanda moved back into a tie at 7-7 with an Elizabeth Green ace on the way to a small lead of their own. The game was again tied at 17, 20 and 22 through 24 with Lake Shore holding the 1 point edge before slipping back. The battle continued with Gowanda up 25-24 followed by Lake Shore up 26-25 and 27-26. From a 27-all tie, Gowanda finally closed out the game with Jillian Gernatt collecting back-to-back service points for a 29-27 win.

Moving to Game 3, it was Lake Shore starting strong 5-1. That gap eventually grew to 17-8. The game was more competitive from there, but Gowanda was not able to avoid a 25-15 loss. In Game 4, an early 3-1 Gowanda start slipped back into a 5-5 tie. Fierce competition and long volleys saw a series of tie scores up to 13-13. from there Gowanda began to pull away. A 4-point run with Ella Luther serving brought the score to 21-14. The score was 22-15 as Elizabeth Green was up to serve. Starting with an ace, the Gowanda advantage went to 24-15. After a minor delay on a errant serve, Gowanda locked down the next point for a 25-16 win in the game.

With the match now tied 2-2, Gowanda went to work in Game 5. For the 4th time this season Gowanda came up strong while the opposition faded in the extended play. A 15-10 Gowanda win in the game gave them a 3-2 match win. As a measure of the intense competition in this match, Gowanda as a team recorded a total 162 digs in the game. Full stats are listed below.

Elizabeth Green 12 kills, 1 assist, 4 aces, 5 digs, 1 block
Aubrie Heron 10 kills, 1 dig, 7 blocks
Holland Browning 8 kills, 2 aces, 29 digs
Addison Kota 5 kills, 2 assists, 43 digs, 2 blocks
Lauren Kelly 5 kills, 2 digs, 4 blocks
Jillian Gernatt 1 kill, 39 assists, 1 ace, 10 digs
Corrina John 1 kill, 2 digs
Ella Luther 2 aces, 61 digs
Tessa Kohn 9 digs

Meanwhile, the Pine Valley/Gowanda Varsity girls soccer team was playing a rare night game at Salamanca. In a game that feature more back and forth defense than offense, Pine Valley came up short 1-0. The winning Salamanca goal came with 29:51 left in the first half. With possession of the ball in the corner and two girls positioned in front of the goal, Salamanca made a pass past the near-side girl to the second one. The Pine Valley goaltender, Destiny Lindquist, guarding against a shot from the first girl was unable to get to the other side of the net in time to keep the second girl from scoring. Lindquist did make saves on 13 other Salamanca shots. Pine Valley only managed 6 shots on goal in the game.