Sports N o v e m b e r 1 2 , 2 0 1 0THE COMMUNITY NEWS

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ABILENE BOUND

FOOTBALL

WIN STREAK CONTINUES! Bearcats cap off district play with shutout of Brewer BearsBy Dominic GenettiThe Community News

They already punched a ticket to the playoffs in their fi nal home game of the season on Oct. 29, but the Aledo Bearcats still had a state-ment to make and a job to fi n-ish on the 2010 regular season as they closed on the road against the Brewer Bears.

The remaining task on the grid iron for the orange and black was fi n-ishing the season undefeated. Aledo went undefeated in 2009 in district play as they pushed all the way to the state championship, but a loss to Parker County rival Weatherford gave the Bearcats a 15-1 fi nish to the 2009 season.

But that was not the case in 2010. In fact, the Bearcats pulled a double whammy by not only going 10-0 on the season, but they shut out the Bears 48-0.

“We focused really hard on pitch-ing the shutout,” senior defensive back Rylan Riney said after the game last Friday night, “going out with a bang on the last game right before the playoffs.”

Turn to FOOTBALL, page 7A

JAMES ALBRITTON/SALTFORKIMAGES.COM

Aledo defenders, including Hunter Powell (46) and Jake Tago (3) smother a Brewer ball carrier. The Aledo defense allowed only 64 points through all district games, the same number of points scored by the offense in the opening district game against Keller Timber Creek.

! Ladycats defeat Granbury, advance to Regional TournamentBy Dominic GenettiThe Community News

As she landed on her feet, her jubi-lant scream could be heard over the hundreds of cheering fans celebrating an Aledo victory that is sending the Ladycats to the Regional Tournament for the fi rst time in two years.

“That was amazing, I just had so much adrenaline, just jumped as high as I could and hit my hardest,” Briana Sharratt said after her victo-rious spike. “I’m just really excited, we played our hardest.”

The 6’1” sophomore executed a powerful kill too hard to handle for the Granbury Lady Pirates and with-in an instant the entire varsity squad raided the court in overwhelming excitement. The leaping spike gave Aledo a match four victory and sealed the deal for the girls’ advancement to the regional semifi nals.

“I am so proud of these girls,” Aledo head coach Kathy Goings said over the shouting students singing the school’s alma mater. “They’re just fi ghters, they’ve been fi ghters all year long.

“Never once did I doubt them because I knew once we get things clicking they couldn’t stop us.”

Match 1: Aledo 23, Granbury 25

Inside the dimly lit Weatherford High School gymnasium fans packed the building normally fi lled with spectators dressed in blue and white paraphernalia. This time the atmosphere was packed to the raf-ters with fans draped in orange in support of Aledo and purple for the Lady Pirates of Granbury.

It took nearly 30 seconds, 29.7 to be exact, for the fi rst point to be scored and it was Granbury who would attack fi rst. Aledo came back to tie on the next serve, but it was the Lady Pirates who would pull ahead before the Ladycats could come back and retie the match at six.

With sets from sophomore Mallory Powell, blocks from 6’3” junior Tyler Gromann and kills

from team senior co-captain Jordan Jacobs, Aledo pulled ahead breakinga 7-7 tie on a 5.1-second volley. The Ladycats gained three more points before Granbury came back to hold a brief 12-11 lead, but again it was the Ladycats who prevailed.

Aledo began to run away withthe match boasting a 22-17 lead, but the quick play of the Lady Pirates kept the match moving at a fast pace and no lead was safe. Granbury was crawling back. Aledo gained a 23-18 lead on a 6.5-second volley, and all the Ladycats needed was a two more points to take the fi rst match in a best of fi ve game.

The Aledo fans began to rise and stand in the retractable bleachers. Students started chanting.

“JOR-DAN, JOR-DAN,” they shouted while stomping their feetand clapping their hands as Jacobs went to serve.

But Aledo couldn’t and wouldn’t gain a single point for the remainderof the match.

The Ladycat back row began to struggle and dives toward the bulletspeeding kills coming from the Lady Pirates were allowing Granbury togain ground on the scoreboard.

“I don’t even know what hap-pened, I just couldn’t focus,” senior Taylor Brown said. “I just felt like the game was going really fast for me.”

Granbury stopped the Ladycats, tied the game at 23 after a suspense-ful 15.4-second volley before coming away with the 25-23 win.

“It was very intense and we should have taken it,” Goings said. “We had them at 22-17 and we went on a run of errors.”

Match 2: Aledo 27, Granbury 25

The momentum from match one carried over to match two and it was Granbury once again who would attack fi rst.

The Lady Pirates had a 2-1 lead before Aledo came back to tie the match three different times. TheLadycats even had a short 5-4 lead before Granbury battled back to go up 7-5. But Aledo tied the game again at 7 and would control the match to accumulate eight more points.

Turn to REGION, page 8A

JIM SHARRAT/SPECIAL TO THE COMMUNITY NEWS

Sophomore Setter Mallory Powell (20) sets up senior Jordan Jacobs (15) for a kill in the Regional Quarterfinal volleyball game against Granbury in Weatherford Tuesday night, Nov. 9. The Ladycats now advance to the Regional Tournament at McMurry University in Abilene Friday and Saturday, Nov. 12-13.