Bearcats ace West Ouachita matchup in prep volleyball

The Ruston volleyball team swept the West Ouachita Chiefs (25-11, 25-8, 25-7) Thursday night to improve to 5-3 overall thanks to dominant performances at the service line.

Laia Canovas led the way with 9 service aces, including 8 in the third set alone, while Harper Cauley had 4 aces and 12 kills for the match. Baylor Cauley racked up 7 aces and 4 kills as well. For the match, Ruston put up 22 service aces to West Ouachita’s 26 total points.

“It’s what we’ve been waiting on. I’ve been waiting to see that,” Ruston head coach Amanda Cauley said postgame. “I felt like they got their confidence, and sometimes you just have to get a couple reps underneath you that go the way you want. They were serving fantastic. And sometimes you learn from a loss. We lost some last weekend, and we lost a tough match against Byrd and hopefully it lit a fire under them to repair the things and focus a little bit more on some of the smaller details. I thought they executed well tonight (Thursday).”

Ruston was originally scheduled to face Episcopal of Acadiana and West Ouachita on Thursday, but Episcopal couldn’t make the trip due to severe weather. The change had no impact on the Bearcats as they took it to West Ouachita throughout the night.

In the first set, West Ouachita’s brief 1-0 lead went downhill in a hurry as Ruston went on a 7-0 run to put the set out of reach. Rilee Atwood’s strong serves, including a pair of aces, helped in the early push. Harper was sharp in her strikes early on with 4 kills in the set to go with a pair of kills for Baylor. Ruston would cruise to a 25-11 win in the first frame.

Once again, West Ouachita started the second set with a 1-0 lead and once again watched it disappear as the Bearcats went on a 10-0 run thanks to strong serves from Baylor, scoring 4 aces as part of Ruston’s first seven points.

Ruston kept up with an 8-2 run to extend its lead as Baylor added another ace to her line while Harper wasn’t too far behind, closing the set with four aces of her own.

The third set was the best of the night as Ruston led the entire way, even as West Ouachita crept around to cut it to 6-4.

Just as the Chiefs got close, Ruston turned to Canovas at the service line and began to dominate the Chiefs with serves that hit floor, face, and ceiling pipes as the foreign exchange student all but packed West Ouachita’s bags with 8 aces in the set, including seven in a row at one point.

When Canovas wasn’t delivering strong serves, Harper closed her night with 5 kills in the closing set to win 25-7.

“We have so much potential. It’s just going to be about consistency with this group,” Cauley said. “ We knew we were building. My passers are good. Offensively, we’re getting better every single day, every single week. I feel like those that have watched from August to now, you can see an improvement offensively.

“We’re still going to do great. We’ve just had to learn how to mesh, what our strengths and weaknesses are and then what we’re going to do about those and how we’re going to respond in the tough situations.”

Ruston returns to action Monday in a home match against Northwood- Shreveport.