Pine River-Backus' varsity volleyball team took first place out of 12 teams in a tournament hosted by both the PR-B and Pequot Lakes High Schools.
The Tigers played their first two matches in Pine River and finished with two matches in Pequot.
PR-B's first match was against the Park Rapids Panthers, and it went into three games with the Tigers winning the first game 25-23 and losing the second game 21-25.
The Tigers started off the third game by going down 4-9, but they managed to work their way back up thanks in part to two kills from Crysta Christensen and one from Scarlett Rudlang, and a couple of nice blocks by Katie Wangberg and Trisha Mongan.
The final score was 16-14, in favor of the Tigers. PR-B's second match was against the International Falls Broncos, and the Tigers won by scores of 25-16 and 25-17.
The Tigers' third match was against the Pequot Lakes Patriots in Pequot, and it also went into three games with the Tigers winning the first game 25-18, losing the second game 23-25, and winning the third game 16-14 with a six point rally, including a game winning block-for-a-kill by Christensen, and major upset after being down 10-14.
PRB's final match was against the Sebeka Trojans, and the Tigers won by scores of 25-22 and 25-14.
"I thought the girls fought hard all day. They had to work hard to close out matches, especially against Pequot when we had to fight off several match points in order to advance," commented Coach Collin Frazier on the match.
"We had a chance to watch Sebeka in the semis and noticed that they are very technically sound. We knew we would have to play smart volleyball to have a chance against them and the girls really came through.
We served at 97 percent against them and only had one service error out of 47 serves. We won game one with a block which was nice to see. Lastly, we had 19 blocks in that match with seven players recording at least one block. To be the only team of 12 to finish the tournament undefeated was a real treat for us."
Overall stats
Katie Wangberg- Four Aces, 58 assists, 10 kills, and nine blocks
Crysta Christensen- Nine aces, 20 kills, and four blocks
Kendra Hamilton- One ace, 20 kills, and 11 blocks
Scarlett Rudlang- Three aces, 10 kills, and two blocks
Emalee Arends- Four aces, four assists, five kills, and one block
Trisha Mongan- Eight kills and five blocks
Kelsey Kline- One kill and three blocks
Nikki Tulenchik- Five aces
Hannah Zaske- Three aces
