The Iowa Falls-Alden volleyball team will host Clarion-Goldfield-Dows in the North Central Conference opener for both teams Thursday. It’ll air on 104.9 KLMJ.
The Cadets (1-2) will play for the first time in a week, having split a triangular with AGWSR and South Tama last week. As they look to take another step forward as a program, Co-head Coach Nikki Allen says it’s crucial that the setters are intentional in finding the best hitters.
“One thing we’ve really been working on with our setters is their set selection,” Allen says. “That makes me happy that those two had a lot of the kills because we need to go to our go-to players and really buy into that team mentality that if somebody’s on, that’s who we’re going to set.”
Carlea Dagel leads with 2.5 kills per set, the fifth best in the North Central Conference. Leah Allen and Tessa Lorenz-Neumann are tied for second on the team at 1.3.
Clarion-Goldfield-Dows (2-3) last competed at a home tournament Saturday, which was their season opener. Head Coach Jessica Nail says overcoming a relative height disadvantage defensively has been an early factor.
“We’re not the tallest group of girls,” Nail says. “I think defense has to be a strong point of emphasis for us. Just that effort, making those hustle plays, not letting balls drop, that tenacity on defense is going to be huge for us. We’re pretty good if we can get that first pass going. We’ve got some good offensive threats up the net, but just again with our lack of height, it’s mind over matter a little bit too with how we enter each game and each match.”
Several players reached double figures in last week’s tournament, led by Claire Kirstein with 14 kills.
Coverage will start at 6:45 p.m., followed by the first serve at 7:00.
