Monahans Dominates Canyon in Quarters
    By Chris Gove~~Odessa American, November 9, 2005

LUBBOCK   A potential pitfall for Monahans High School’s volleyball team was hurdled with ease Tuesday with a 25-17, 25-12, 25-14 victory against Canyon in a Region I-3A quarterfinal match at Lubbock Christian University’s Rip Griffin Center.

In the rematch of a regional quarterfinal that Monahans (39-3) nearly lost a year ago, Canyon (31-6) seemed to be a fireplug opponent with revenge on its mind.

But Monahans showed the experience it earned while winning the Class 3A state championship last season with rock-solid play throughout its lineup along with a spectacular effort — or was it routine? — from senior Brittany Hughes.

Ultimately, a match expected to be a showdown turned into a blowout before a raucous crowd of about 800.

“I think we all felt that we just had to have confidence in ourselves and play through,” said senior Alison Miller, who recorded 10 kills.   “They wanted to get back at us, and we just wanted to beat them again.  Our goal was to beat them in three and that’s what we did, so we’re pretty happy about that.”

Monahans advanced to the Region I-3A Tournament, which will be back at LCU on Friday and Saturday.  The Lady Loboes will play in the 9:15 p.m. semifinal against Graham (23-14), which is coached by 1997 Monahans graduate Leah Johnson and advanced to regionals with a three-game sweep of Little Elm.

The match started tensely and Canyon led 6-5 in Game 1 before Hughes tied the match 6-6 with a kill and went to the service line.

Hughes then cranked out eight consecutive serves, during which she had three aces and Miller had three kills.  When the nine-point run ended, Monahans led 14-7 and the match never really was competitive again.

Hughes finished with 18 kills, six aces, 17 service points, 10 digs and 2.5 blocks.  As a team, Monahans scored 45 points on serve compared to just 13 for Canyon, with juniors Catherine Cutbirth and Bethany Willmon adding eight service points of their own.

“What happened in the first game was they controlled Brittany a little bit early and didn’t let her just get off at the net,”

Monahans head coach Patty Dominguez said.  “But when she got back there to serve, they couldn’t stop her.  They didn’t have any control over here and they couldn’t block her and they couldn’t stop her at that point, so that worked out really well.”

Monahans also played a strong defensive match with 47 digs, with Cutbirth and Bailey Marcum providing 11 each.  Also, senior setter Candace Swarb had 31 assists and seven digs.

With just about everything and every player clicking, Monahans went on two five-point runs, a six-point run and the nine-point run in addition to several either three or four points long.

After closing Game 1 with a four-run run, Canyon only scored three consecutive points twice in Games 2 and 3.

Canyon did lead Game 3 by a 4-3 score, but Monahans scored six straight points for a 9-4 lead behind three kills by Miller, two kills and an ace by Hughes, and one kill by Swarb.

“It didn’t matter who was across the net,” Dominguez said.  “We were going to have to play regardless.  We had to take away the focus from it being Canyon as opposed to it being the regional quarterfinals.  We had to come out and play our type of ball to accomplish the kind of goals we have set for ourselves.”

Region I-3A Quarterfinal
At Lubbock Christian’s Rip Griffin Center