High school volleyball roundup - Cats take down Aquinas

Blue Springs missed a chance to beat a state champion Tuesday, but got the job done Thursday.
The Wildcats knocked off St. Thomas Aquinas out of Overland Park, Kan., 25-19, 25-23.
Kaylee Miller had eight kills, while Morgan Reynolds added six kills and two blocks. Lisa Henning finished with four kills and four blocks. Kieley Culbertson dished out 16 assists, while Ashton Bodenstab led the defense with 14 digs.
“You look at our schedule and see we have two defending state champions (Aquinas and O’Hara Tuesday night),” Wildcats coach Katie Grusing said. “Tonight, we played well. I thought we played consistently. We were good the whole match. There were no hugs dips. This was a good win.”
The junior varsity team lost in three games. Scores were not available.
OAK GROVE 25-25, RICHMOND 8-11: Oak Grove recovered from a season-opening loss with a one-sided win Thursday.
Taylor Vickers and Nikki Rajkovacz each had five kills, while Liz White added 13 assists and 12 aces in a home win over Richmond.
“This is a total turnaround from how we played Tuesday night,” Panthers coach Amber Evans said. “It was good to see. This will build confidence in the girls. Hopefully we can carry it over into our next match.”
O’HARA 25-25, BLUE SPRINGS SOUTH 18-14: The host Jaguars played close, but could not play close enough in a loss ot the defending Class 3 state champions Thursday.
“Going into the match, we felt like we had nothing to lose,” South coach Carmen Johnson said. “O’Hara was supposed to win, so we just wanted to go out and play hard. We were trying to eliminate our errors and roll with their kills.”
Carly Jo Sojka finished with six digs, seven kills and four aces for South (1-1). Natalie Gieseke dished out eight assists.
WINNETONKA 25-25, FORT OSAGE 13-19: Elaine McAllister’s five kills weren’t enough to propel the Indians (0-2) to a nonconference win Thursday.
“From what we’ve gone through – losing five potential starters in the last three weeks – the amount of improvement we’ve had over the last two days is great,” Indians coach Sean Barrett said. “We’re still struggling with serve receive. We’re still a little tentative. But every one of them has a positive attitude and they understand what it takes. We’ll do fine.”
The Indians lost the JV match, 24-26, 25-13, 25-13.
WARRENSBURG 25-25, GRAIN VALLEY 15-20: Grain Valley had trouble putting the ball away against Warrensburg, suffering its first loss of the season.
“We weren’t mentally on,” Eagles coach Keri Cochran said. “Our defense and passing did very well. But we had trouble terminating the ball. We had a lot of mental errors on rotation with who should be where.”
Whitney Broughton had eight assists, six digs and three kills for the Eagles. Lindsey Laber finished with five kills, while Paige Mead added nine digs for the Eagles (1-1).
RAYMORE-PECULIAR 25-25, RAYTOWN 19-12: Raytown hung with the Panthers in the first game, but had trouble keep up in the second of a nonconference loss Thursday.
“We played well the first game,” Bluejays coach Cassie Reichert said. “In the second game, our communication and intensity broke down, and we couldn’t play as well.”
Raytown falls to 1-1 with the loss.