ST. GEORGE – There were no upsets in Region 9 volleyball play on Tuesday night. Three teams completed season sweeps over their opponents. Snow Canyon won its match, but suffered a key loss earlier in the week when senior team captain Ally Dunston was lost for the season due to injury. Dixie hoped to get DeAubry Bowers back for Tuesday night, but will have to wait a little longer till a requisite knee brace arrives. Below are summaries of Tuesday night’s matches:

Desert Hills 3, Dixie 1

The Lady Flyers did something no other region team had been able to accomplish. They took a set from preseason Region 9 favorite Desert Hills. The Lady Thunder still won in four 25-20, 25-16, 23-25, 25-18.

“Tonight we learned we can’t relax and just go through the motions,” said Desert Hills head coach Jill Swaney. “In order to improve, we need to always play hard no matter what the scoreboard says.

“We started slow and had to fight against a very good Dixie defense,” continued Swaney. “With each match we play, the competition gets stronger. Every team is working hard to improve its game going into the second half of region play. I was pleased with Jessica Harris and her serving tonight. It helped overcome a big deficit in that first set and the spark Rachel Winters gave us as well in the comeback set. Charity Bradley has consistently produced to help us end the match with the win.”

For Desert Hills, Bradley and Winters had 24 and 15 kills, respectively. Winters and Harris recorded five service aces apiece. Winters (26), Bradley (16) and Katelyn Taylor (10) all recorded double-digit digs. Hailee Harmer led the team with 44 assists. Harris led the team with four blocks.

“We had our up and down moments,” said Dixie head coach Stacy Leavitt. “Our team is getting better We just need to get over the hump. I was pleased with Brooklyn (Wright), how she ran the court and distributed the ball. Risha (Tiatia) and Aspen (Bair) displayed great floor leadership tonight.”

For the Lady Flyers, Wright had 32 assists. She spread the wealth. Tiatia led with nine kills. Tyler Stilson had eight. Bair and Ella Burrows each had seven. Bair also led the team with 12 digs.

Desert Hills stays perfect in region play with a 6-0 record and sports an 18-7 overall record. The Lady Thunder will host Hurricane on Thursday night. The Lady Flyers fall to 3-3 in region play and to 9-6 overall. Dixie will travel to Cedar.

Snow Canyon 3, Cedar 1

Snow Canyon perhaps solidified its hold on the final playoff spot out of Region 9 with the four-set win over the visiting Lady Reds, 25-15, 25-21, 14-25, 25-12. The win puts the Lady Warriors two games in front of Cedar and gives the Warriors a sweep of Cedar in region play.

“I was proud of the girls tonight,” said Snow Canyon head coach Ryan Rarick. “We had a real tough week last week and it was made tougher with news today that we’ll most likely be without our senior leader, Ally Dunston, for the remainder of the year.”

Dunston went down in practice earlier this week and visited the doctor today. The diagnosis was a torn anterior cruciate ligament. “We wanted to win this for Ally,” said Warrior outside hitter Sammi Johnston. “She has a lot of our stats this season, but the bigger loss is her leadership on the floor.”

The Lady Warriors served extremely well, recording 22 percent of them as aces. Cami Utley, Jamee Carpenter, Hallie Remund and Ina Fakahua all recorded four apiece.

“The coach gives us the zone where he wants us to serve the ball,” said Fakahua. “If we can place the ball well, we usually have good success.”

“Our service was instrumental in coming back to win the fourth set,” said Rarick. “Fakahua and Utley both came up big in the final set.”

Sammi Johnston led the team with 13 kills. Camryn Johnson led with 18 assists. Johnson and Hallie Remund shared team high in digs with 12 apiece. For Cedar Kylee Beatty led the team with 10 kills. Dream Weaver and libero Shaun Bauman had 14 and 13 digs respectively. Kylee Field led the team with 26 assists.

“We started slowly and were unable to execute any offense in set one,” said Cedar head coach Nicole Anglin. “We picked up momentum at the end of set two and carried that forward to the third set and pulled out a win. Our downfall was our serve-receive in set four.”

The Lady Warriors improve to 3-3 in Region 9 and 5-11 overall. Snow Canyon will visit Pine View on Thursday night. The Lady Reds fall to 1-5 in region and 8-8 overall. Cedar will play host to Dixie Thursday night.

Pine View 3, Hurricane 0

Pine View swept the Lady Tigers 25-22, 25-17, 25-18. The Panthers coupled their scrappy defense with a .156 attack percentage to pull out the win.

Individually, Emily Lantor led Pine View with 11 kills. Cassidy Murdock had 29 assists. Aubrey Hendrickson and Cydnee McGuire recorded double-digit digs with 15 and 11 respectively. For Hurricane Kansas Lytle led the team with 11 digs. Hailey Homer had a game line of seven assists, five digs, three kills and two service aces.

“We served well and I was happy with the way we played together,” said Hurricane head coach Content Marshall. “We just couldn’t pull out a win.”

The Lady Panthers improve to 5-1 in region and 17-8 overall. Pine View will host Snow Canyon Thursday night. The Lady Tigers remain winless in region and 2-12 overall. Hurricane will travel to Desert Hills Thursday afternoon.

Region 9 Volleyball Standings
1. Desert Hills 6-0 (18-7)
2. Pine View 5-1 (17-8)
3. Dixie 3-3 (9-6)
4. Snow Canyon 3-3 (5-11)
5. Cedar 1-5 (8-8)
6. Hurricane 0-6 (2-12)

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