Pleasanton volleyball headed to Regional tournament this weekend

Pleasanton’s Kiley Wiechring goes for a dig during the Lady Eagles area round game against Bishop last Friday in George West. Pleasanton beat Bishop to advance to the regional quarterfinals played last night. J GARCIA | PLEASANTON EXPRESS

Playing from behind isn’t a situation Pleasanton has been in much this season. The Lady Eagles (43-2), however, weren’t phased after losing the first set in their 3-1 (19- 25, 25-13, 25-19, 25-12) area round victory over Bishop Friday night in George West.

After trailing 14-12 in the opening set, the Lady Eagles fell behind following a series of mental errors. The Lady Badgers capitalized and managed to start the match out on the right foot and go up 1-0. Pleasanton Head Coach Gabriel Aguirre felt his team wasn’t playing to the level they were capable of.

“We had already talked about that when we show up for a game, we can’t take the other team for granted,” Pleasanton Head Coach Gabriel Aguirre said. “Last year, we beat Boerne in the first round and then lost to Needville in the second round, and we didn’t perform at all well and the first thing I told them was, ‘We’re headed back the way we were last year. We have to fix all the little mistakes.’ We were trying to do too much. I told them to just go back to what we do best and we’ll be fine and they did and we survived.”

Pleasanton began the second set as a totally different group, jumping out to an 8-4 lead and continuing to keep their foot on the gas. A 6-0 run by the Lady Eagles gave them a 14-5 lead and forced a timeout by the Badgers.

The Lady Eagles were able to even the match at a set apiece behind key plays from Kiley Wiechring and Sadie McAda at the net, who finished with 22 and 11 kills, respectively. Beginning the season as the libero, Wiechring was moved to to fulfill the role of an outside hitter. The junior has since been a key contributor to the Lady Eagles success.

“I just knew at the beginning of the season when I started as a libero, we had a different lineup and it wasn’t working,” Wiechring said. “Once I stepped into the [new] position, I just knew what I had to do to help the team.”

After claiming a 14-7 lead in a critical third set, Pleasanton looked as if they were going to run away and go up 2-1. The Lady Badgers quickly stormed back and trailed 17-16. With a strong effort by the Lady Eagles back line, Pleasanton closed out the set on an 8-3 run.

Four Lady Eagles finished the game with double-digit digs. McAda and Wiechring led the way with 31 and 20 kills, respectively. Senior’s Maddie Estrada and Victoria Urbanczyk each recorded 14 digs in the victory.

The win over Bishop allowed Pleasanton to advance to Tuesday’s regional quarterfinal against Port Lavaca Calhoun.

Just like their area game, the Lady Eagles fell behind after losing the first set, 25-22 but bounced back to win the next three sets in a row, 25-21, 25-17 and 25-22 to advance to the class 4A region IV tournament.

The regional tournament will be held at Littleton Gym in the Blossom Athletic Complex up in San Antonio.

Pleasanton will face the winner of Wimberley v. Bellville in the regional semifinals on Friday at 2 p.m. Results from that game were not available at press time. If Pleasanton advances to the regional final it will be played on Saturday at 11 a.m.