The emotions of playing on Senior Night helped to propel Aberdeen Central on its last guaranteed home match of the season on Tuesday night.
The Golden Eagles swept past Sioux Falls Roosevelt 25-22, 25-18, 25-15 in non-conference volleyball action at Golden Eagles Arena.
“It felt really good to have one last home game,” said Central senior Taylin Kleffman. “I felt like our energy was so high and we all just played together and got the game done.”
Sophomore Kamdyn Borge also knew the importance of Senior Night as she returned to the court after being cleared to play on Monday.
“I’ve been off and on the court all season with my injury and I mean, obviously I just wanna play,” Borge said. “So being back out there, especially on Senior Night, was really special to me.”
Central got off to a slow start in the match as the Rough Riders hung in with neither team pulling away. The Golden Eagles knew that even though Roosevelt has just two wins on the year, they could not afford to look past any opponent.
“That’s something that we talk about in the locker room a lot,” Borge said. “We can never underestimate any team. I mean, this is AA volleyball.”
With the Golden Eagles up 22-15 in the first set, Roosevelt went on a bit of a streak cutting the deficit to within two points, prompting a time out from Central coach Jackie Bindenagel.
“Coming out of the timeout, we just talked about being efficient. We were making errors, consecutive errors,” said Bindenagel. “We knew we needed to put three (points) together and (Lauryn Burckhard) took care of the ball in the end.”
The Golden Eagles set Burckhard who immediately scored a point starting a surge that helped to lift Central to win the opening set.
Alivia Miller set the tone for the second set with an ace right off the bat.
“We went in streaks where we really hit some seams with our serves, which is absolutely what we need to do every match,” said Bindenagel. “And she really got us going from the service line.”
Kleffman led the Golden Eagles with three total aces, including a pair in the final set as Central completed the sweep.
“I was just seeing that the zones were really open and then they had to adjust to my serve,” Kleffman said, “so that made it more challenging to work on my zone serve.”
Although the zone serves began to get more challenging, Kleffman still found success from the service line getting the Rough Riders out of system, allowing the Golden Eagles to run the offense that they wanted.
“It plays a big role in running our offense,” Kleffman said. “The more out of system they are, the more consistent we can be and run our offense faster.”
In the second set, Borge checked into the match for the first time, slowly integrating to getting back on the court. It didn’t take too long to find her stride as she recorded a pair of kills and an assisted block.
“Obviously right away, coming out of something like I was, I was a little bit hesitant,” said Borge. “But right away, all of my teammates were right behind me and I knew that I was gonna be just fine. So right away, I was back to how I normally play and it was just fun.”
Roosevelt scored the first three points of the third set, but Central responded quickly, taking a 5-4 lead and never trailed again for the remainder of the match.
“That was the focus between sets two and three is to start strong and I thought they did a pretty good job,” Bindenagel said. “We got down a couple points, but they responded quickly.”
Kleffman finished the night with seven digs, three sets assists, and three aces. Kleffman said she enjoys one stat more than the others.
“Definitely when I give my hitters some assists,” Kleffman said. “They don’t know when it’s coming and they just put the ball away.”
She also talked about her defense on the back line.
“Definitely just reading the block is one way to really help, know where to line up and just throwing your body on the floor hoping you get that dig,” Kleffman said. “Sometimes it hurts, but it’s OK.”
The Golden Eagles, 15-10 on the season, will hit the road to take on Sioux Falls Jefferson to close out the regular season. Central is still fighting for a chance to host a SoDak 16 match next week.
“I thought they finished the match stronger than they started it, so you know, right now we’re just thinking about Thursday,” Bindenagel said. “We need a good practice (Wednesday) and then take care of Jefferson.”
Serving: Aberdeen Central 66-73 8 aces (Taylin Kleffman 18-20 3 aces, Alivia Miller 11-12 2 aces, Lauryn Burckhard 9-9 2 aces).
Hitting: Aberdeen Central 75-86 33 kills (Burckhard 23-28 13 kills, Kenadi Withers 17-18 6 kills, Jaidyn Forsyth 8-9 4 kills, Kyley Wirebaugh 9-9 4 kills, Kamdyn Borge 8-10 4 kills).
Assists: Aberdeen Central 75-75 30 assists (Camryn Albrecht 28-28 14 assists, Miller 32-32 11 assists, Kleffman 10-10 3 assists)
Digs: Aberdeen Central 39 (Burckhard 8, Kleffman 7, Wirebaugh 7).
Blocks: Aberdeen Central 1 solo 4 assisted (Burckhard 1 solo, Karlie Nieman 1 assisted, Wither 1 assisted, Borge 1 assisted, Amelia Rife 1 assisted).
Records: Sioux Falls Roosevelt 2-23; Aberdeen Central 15-10.
