Newton volleyball can’t overcome Pella on Senior Night

Another big night at the net by Kadance Ahn was not enough for the Newton volleyball team on Tuesday.

The Cardinals hosted rival Pella for their final Little Hawkeye Conference match of the season, couldn’t completely dig out of a large deficit in the opening set, lost momentum in the middle of the second and had trouble with a key service run in the third during a 25-23, 25-19, 25-18 home loss.

“When our serve receive breaks down, it’s hard for us to do anything else,” Newton head volleyball coach Heidi Woollums said. “We’ve been close with most of the conference teams. Tonight was an exception though.”

Pella improved to 20-5 against Newton since 2001 and the Lady Dutch have won 11 straight in the series.

The Cardinals trailed 20-13 in the opening set before rallying to get within 23-22 late in the frame.

Pella wound up on the winning end a few points later and had little trouble with its rivals from that point on and spoiled the Cardinals’ Senior Night.

“The seniors all did their job tonight,” Woollums said. “Kadance Ahn stepped up and did everything she needed to do. Addie (White) served well, Gracie (Clayton) made some plays, Chloe (Rorabaugh) put some down and Hailey Sumpter played great.”

The six seniors recognized before the match were Ahn, Hailey Sumpter, Chloe Rorabaugh, Gracie Clayton, Addison White and Haylie Ryan.

Ahn led the Cardinals with 24 kills, 19 digs and three blocks. Her kill efficiency was .320.

She is 17 kills away from 1,000 for her career. She’s posted career bests for kills and digs in a season with 301 and 229, respectively.

“If she can have someone else do that consistently with her in a match, wow,” Woollums said. “We can’t rely on just one person to do everything.”

The Cardinals (13-12, 1-5 in the conference) led 2-1 and 6-5 after Ahn kills in the second set.

Pella scored six of the next seven points to take the lead for good. Back-to-back kills by Ahn trimmed the margin to 11-9, a serve error by Pella made it 13-11 and an Ahn block kept the margin at two.

The Lady Dutch turned a two-point advantage into six after scoring five of the next six points. Two more kills by Ahn trimmed it to 22-18, but Pella ended the game by scoring three of the final four points.

The Cardinals led 5-1 in the third set, but the Lady Dutch (18-17, 3-3) used a 6-2 run to even the score at 7-all. It also was tied at 9-all before Newton scored four in a row thanks in part to another Ahn kill and an ace by Chloe Swank.

Trailing 13-11, Bryn Higginbotham served five aces during a 6-0 run to push the visitors in front for good. The Cardinals didn’t get closer than three the rest of the way.

Woollums made a few lineup changes during the 6-0 run but nothing seemed to work for Newton.

“We had trouble with our serve receive. I was trying to find someone who could make a pass,” Woollums said. “And sometimes you just want to give the server something else to look at.”

The Cardinals will be the No. 6 seed for the conference tournament on Thursday. Their lone LHC win was a five-set victory over Pella Christian.

“We are at the point now, it’s crunch time,” Woollums said. “And I don’t feel like we’ve played the conference teams to the best of our ability. The good news is, the tournament is here on Thursday. We play well in tournaments and we play well in sets to 21 not 25. Those are situations where we play well.”

Macy Lampe finished with 31 assists and 11 digs, Delaney Woollums tallied six kills and nine digs and Sumpter chipped in three kills, three blocks and two digs.

Swank registered 13 digs, Clayton added two assists, two blocks and two digs and Ryan secured two digs.

The Cardinals, who came into the match with one of the best serve percentages in Class 4A, were 55-of-57 in serves with three aces. Lampe served 14-of-14, Sumpter was 12-of-12 and Swank finished 10-of-10.

“Defensively, you can see at times that we are digging everything and making it tough on them,” Coach Woollums said. “We hit the floor and got some momentum going, but we can’t do that for pieces of the game. We have to consistently do that.”

Notes: The Cardinals finished with 10 blocks and posted a kill efficiency of .162. … Swank’s 13 digs pushed her to a new career-high for a season with 237. … The Cardinals will host the LHC tournament beginning at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday. They will be in Pool B, which takes place in the lower gym. They open the tournament with 4A No. 9 Norwalk before also playing 13th-ranked Dallas Center-Grimes. The top seed is 4A No. 2 Indianola. “Maybe playing in (the lower) gym will help us take our mind off some things,” Coach Woollums said.