| CEU’s Ashlie Baker (3) and Melissa Webb (8) go up together to block a shot by a CSI player in Friday’s game. |
The Women’s Golden Eagle Volleyball team lost to first ranked College of Southern Idaho Friday night. It was a spirited game, but the Golden Eagles were facing a much stronger team. Southern Idaho won the match 3-0. The game scores were 16-30, 14-30, and 22-30.
Southern Idaho beat the Golden Eagles soundly the first two games, but the Eagles rallied noticeably during the third game to the accompaniment of some enthusiastic cheering and encouragement from the hometown crowd. But, in spite of a great effort, they just couldn’t overcome the strong opposition.
Coach Brent Martindale praised his team for a good effort, but admitted that they were outclassed.
“Southern Idaho is currently ranked number one in the nation,” he said. “Southern Idaho is a very good team for a lot of reasons. They are physically very strong and they are good athletes. They are great at serving and great at setting-up shots.”
Going into the game, Southern Idaho had an amazing record of 40 wins and one loss.
“I think our team was a little intimidated going in,” the coach added. Southern Idaho’s reputation is impressive and the Golden Eagles had played them before. The Eagles lost to CSI on September 24 in Twin Falls. Friday was their second match of the season.
“I’m proud of the CEU team,” coach Martindale said. “We are a young team and we’ve got some maturing to do, but we’ve got a lot of potential.” He said he is very happy about how hard his sophomores have worked this season. When pressed about who he thought did an exceptionally good job during the game, the coach said he felt that the whole team had made a great effort, but Maren Ericson and Brittani Bently had both done very well.
On Saturday the Golden Eagles met North Idaho College for the second time of the season and again lost. North Idaho is also a very strong team that is ranked number six in the nation and second in the league. The Golden Eagles started strong but were unable to defeat the opposing team. The final match score was 0-3. The individual game scores were 21-30, 18-30, and 16-30.
The next Golden Eagle volleyball game at home will be against Snow College on Nov. 3 at 7 p.m.