Published: October 06, 2008 11:35 am      

NCTC Lady Lions Defeat Cisco

By DARIN ALLRED

Register Sports Editor

The North Central Texas College Lady Lions volleyball team picked up a key conference win Thursday night when they knocked off Cisco Junior College in three games at Lions Fieldhouse.

NCTC defeated the Lady Wranglers 25-18, 25-18, 25-17. The Lady Lions and Lady Wranglers are both now 1-1 in conference play.

The Lady Lions dominated the match, trailing on the scoreboard only once the entire match, which lasted just one hour.

In the first game, Gainesville’s Jordy Phyffer got a kill on the very first point to get NCTC started. The Lady Lions raced out to a 9-3 lead behind five-straight points from freshman Ashley Hardcastle and a kill by Ashley Lee. After a sideout, Andrea Davis served two aces to put NCTC ahead 13-4. Later in the game, Phyffer and Whitesboro’s Leticia Silva added a pair of kills to push the lead to 22-15. Lee closed out the game with another kill for the final 25-18 margin.

The second game started well for the home team as Pilot Point’s Leslye Richmond served three points and Elizabeth Neyland and Kate Harrison added kills as the Lady Lions went up 6-1.

After Cisco came back to tie things up 9-9, Hardcastle served five-straight points and Silva had a kill and a block to put NCTC ahead 15-9. Two more kills by Neyland and three more service points from Richmond pushed the Lion advantage to 20-13. Down the stretch, Hardcastle added two kills and Phyffer had another as NCTC took game two 25-18.

The Lady Lions jumped ahead 5-1 in the third game, but Cisco came back to take their only lead of the night at 8-7. That lead was short-lived though as Davis served four-straight points including an ace and Lee and Harrison added kills to put NCTC ahead 12-8.

Richmond pushed the lead to 16-9 with three nice serves. The Lions went up 21-11 thanks to three service points from Harrison and back-to-back kills by Phyffer. From there, NCTC cruised to a 25-17 win.

Jordy Phyffer finished with 7 kills and 3 blocks; Ashley Hardcastle had 7 kills and 10 digs; Elizabeth Neyland had 4 kills and 14 digs; Kate Harrison had 4 kills, 25 assists and 14 digs; Ashley Lee had 4 kills and 3 blocks; Leticia Silva had 3 kills and 3 blocks; Andrea Davis had 6 digs and 3 aces; and Leslye Richmond added 18 digs.

On Tuesday, the Lady Lions opened conference play with a 25-23, 25-10, 25-18 loss to Temple College.

In that match, Hardcastle had 5 kills and 8 digs; Phyffer had 3 kills, 4 digs and 1 block; Neyland had 3 kills and 6 digs; Harrison had 2 kills, 13 assists and 7 digs; and Richmond had 8 digs.

The Lady Lions will host Blinn College Saturday at 6 p.m., in a non-conference match.