Lady Cats fight off Lady Horns in 4

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Lady Cats fight off Lady Horns in 4

Gabriel Pruett

The Orange Leader

ORANGEFIELD — Hustle has always been a big word around the Orangefield Lady Bobcats athletic program.

Hustle came up huge Tuesday evening as the Lady Bobcats came up with their biggest win in District 21-3A play.

Orangefield was all over the place in Bobcat Gym and came away with a four-game victory over Hamshire-Fannett to keep the Lady Bobcats in the playoff race.

The Lady Bobcats won 25-11, 28-30, 25-12 and 25-23.

Now the Lady Bobcats sit a game back of third place in the district standings with a 6-4 record while the Lady Longhorns are sitting at 7-3. Orangefield is 13-14 overall while Hamshire-Fannett is 21-8.

“This is definitely the biggest win of the year,†Orangefield Coach Linda Riddick said. “I told them that we knew we have to win here on out and have to have them all. They are finally starting to believe in themselves.â€

Having belief in being able to win came in to play in Game 4 as Orangefield built up a substantial lead only to see H-F climb back into the mix.

The Lady Bobcats were able to build a 12-2 in the fourth as junior Allie Beach and senior Kaylin Little did what they had been doing all match long — serving Orangefield to victory.

Beach and Little teamed up to hit for seven service points and six Lady Longhorn errors aided the early Orangefield lead.

Hamshire-Fannett did what good teams do and fought back and behind the serve of Macy Howerton took a 20-19 lead later in the game.

The Lady Bobcats did not help the cause with seven errors as the Lady Longhors took the lead.

Orangefield’s Laura Riddick, who had a match-high 16 kills, turned from hitter to setter to send the Lady Bobcats to victory down the stretch.

With Orangefield up 23-22, Riddick set junior Olivia Wagner for a kill before an Orangefield serve found the net making it 24-23.

Riddick then set Little, who had a match-high 17 assists, for the match-winner as Orangefield won Game 4 25-23.

Beach got things rolling for Orangefield in Game 1 as the junior led the match off with five straight points, including four straight aces.

Beach would later hit for three straight aces as Orangefield jumped out to a 17-10 lead.

After a H-F serve found the net, Little did her part and closed the game out with seven straight service points to give Orangefield a 25-11 win in Game 1.

Riddick pounded out two straight kills to end the first game.

Game 2 was a long affair as neither team could pull away yet Orangefield did have a shot late at closing the deal when the Lady Bobcats held a 24-21 lead.

A serve went out of bounds and Hamshire-Fannett’s Yvonne Vega struck for three straight points giving the visitors a 25-24 lead.

The two squads battled shot for shot until a final Orangefield error gave H-F a 30-28 win.

Game 3 was all Orangefield behind strong serves again as it was Jessica Maass and Kayla Moore’s turn to get into the action.

Maass gave Orangfield a 9-5 lead with five straight points and Moore put the game on ice later with five straight to end the game as Orangfield won 25-12.

Moore’s second ace of the night finished the deal in the third game.

Aimee Scales, Maass and Wagner each had four kills in the match while Riddick chimed in eight assists.

Beach finished the night with nine kills.

The Lady Longhorns were led by Kindra Wright who had 12 kills and Kayla Dotson who finished with 12 assists. Danielle Johnson had nine assists and Ariel Stevenson finished with six kills.

The Lady Bobcats will travel to Kirbyville on Friday.