Lady Loboes Feel Sting of Tight Loss in 3A Final                 
    By Chris Gove, Staff Writer ~Odessa American ~ November 20, 2006

SAN MARCOS  Given the choice of losing a tight match or getting blown out, the answer is quite simple.

Monahans High School’s volleyball team would rather just win, of course, and would have accepted its uneven performance Saturday had it resulted in a state title.

Instead, Monahans was left searching for the reasons to explain why it lost 25-23, 19-25, 22-25, 25-23, 15-11 to Bellville in the championship match of the UIL Class 3A State Volleyball Championships.

The root of Monahans’ malaise in this case was poor passing, which had senior setter Candace Swarb scrambling to keep her team’s potent offense running efficiently.

It worked at times but not nearly enough to pull off another title for 2004 champion Monahans.

“It’s not hard to accept the silver medal if you had played your best and you know there was nothing you could have done to beat that team,” Swarb said.  “Like two years ago, we played Wimberley and we knew there was nothing we could have done to beat that team.  They were just that good.  I feel we were the better team out there (Saturday), and that’s what disappoints me.”

Monahans was making its fourth straight state appearance and came of age with virtually an entire team of underclassmen while winning last season’s title after falling short the previous two appearances.

Because of such experience, nerves weren’t cited as a problem when the effort to repeat came up short.

“We just didn’t execute,” Monahans head coach Patty Dominguez said.  “Most of the time I don’t think we utilized our hitters well.  We didn’t pass the ball well like we needed to (in order) to take advantage of the offense we have. I felt like if we had done a better job with that, then we would’ve been able to control the match a little bit better.”

Monahans’ longest run of the match was seven points in a Game 2 win, and then it had a five-point run in Game 3.  The Lady Loboes then only scored as many as four consecutive points on two other occasions.

Brittany Hughes finished with 25 kills — her lowest total in four state matches the last two seasons — and Ali Miller had 11, but there never was the feeling they were in position to dominate at the net.

Considering Bellville had only three team blocks, as opposed to nine for Monahans, the opportunity to control the net certainly was there.

“That’s what is most disappointing because we weren’t able to utilize Brittany like we have in the past, and we didn’t utilize Ali like we needed to,” Dominguez said.  “That was just because we didn’t pass.”

Bellville did a lot of its damage with 13 service aces, but that actually was just one more than Monahans’ 12.  The Brahmanettes’ 76 digs were just a handful more than the Lady Loboes’ 65.

“We couldn’t pass the ball on the short serve and we weren’t making the adjustment,” Swarb said.  “Coach had talked to us, and we knew what they were going to do.  We just didn’t make the adjustment.  We have a ball machine at home and you can make that do everything, so we pass topspin all the time.   …We should’ve been used to it.”

Monahans players said after their semifinal victory against Luling on Friday that they felt they had gotten away with a sluggish performance, even though it was a three-game sweep.

Part of that are high standards, but it also could have pointed to trouble on the horizon in Saturday’s championship.

Dominguez said she thought the last time her team played to its peak performance was a regional quarterfinal victory against Canyon — “We were never able to get back to that level again,” she said — in a match billed as a state-type showdown.
Monahans still was within three points of victory, though, before succumbing to Bellville.

“I’m going back to look at what happened when we were up and see what happened and what we could have done differently,” Dominguez said. “We were that close to winning and when you’re that close, that’s what hurts even more.”