Edmunds County Tribune -

Ipswich lost a five-set high school non-conference varsity outcome to Hitchcock-Tulare at Tulare last Thursday.

"Volleyball is one of the few sports that you can score more points than the other team and still lose," explained Coach Trent Osborne. "We outscored them 103 -101 but just didn’t score at the right times."

What happened was that Ipswich got behind with 25-22 and 25-21 losses. But the Tigers regrouped to win set three 25-17 and set four 25-19. That evened things at 2-2, but the Patriots would prevail 15-10 in the tie-breaker set.

One reason was that H-T's Katelyn Schroeder had a huge night with 26 kills and 31 digs. Hitchcock-Tulare totaled 134 hits that featured no fewer that 53 kills.

But Ipswich's Gracie Lange responded with a 47-56 night at the net that featured 16 kills. (Ipswich finished 124-144 there with 41 total kills.) Baylee Kulesa added a 43-49 evening including 12 kills.

Ipswich was 113-113 in setting distributions that included 31 assists, led by Quincy Olivier at 90-90 with 30 assists.

In the serving department Ipswich finished 91 of 100 with 10 aces, paced by Kulesa at 19-20 with a pair aces, while Madison Geditz finished 15-16 with two aces as well.

Ipswich finished the evening with 76 digs, led by Olivier with 21 and Madison Geditz with 20. Their opponents came up with 84 total digs. Ipswich added four assisted blocks.

Ipswich salvaged a JV win.

The varsity outcome left the Tigers at 14-11 at that juncture of their schedule and the Patriots would improve to 11-15.

The Tigers played Leola/Frederick Area Monday night. They will play Herreid/Selby Area on Monday, Oct. 24 and will complete the regular season on Tuesday, Oct. 25 at home against North Central.