LITTLEFORK — It wasn’t pretty, but Littlefork-Big Falls took care of business Thursday in its home opener with a 3-0 victory over rival International Falls (25-19, 25-19, 25-11).
Only one scoreboard worked in the L-BF gymnasium and head coach Kim Wimmer didn’t have stats after the game — two indications it’s still early in the 2009 season — but the Vikings took advantage of numerous mistakes by the visitors and improved to 2-0.
“It’s definitely good to get a win. That’s exciting,” Wimmer said. “That builds confidence for a team without much experience. But we know we can get better.”
For International Falls, too many mistakes lowlighted a performance against a rival.
“It’s many things. It just goes back to basic form and technique,” Broncos head coach Erin Shikowsky said. “And timing is big.”
The Vikings jumped out to a 4-0 lead in Game 1, but the Broncos responded and the two teams tied at 6, 11, 14 and 15. However, back-to-back kills by the Hannahs — Hannah Larson and Hannah Hell — put the Vikings up for good at 17-15. Two straight kills by Haylee Gates made it 22-18, and the game ended with the Broncos committing an unforced error.
Game 2 started off like Game 1 with the Vikings jumping out to a 5-1 lead, but the Broncos would only recover once and tie it at 5. The Broncos trailed 10-9 before L-BF put it in cruise control the rest of the night. After that point, the Vikings outscored the Broncos 40-21, including Game 3’s 14-point victory.
“I’m disappointed in a loss,” Shikowsky said. “You know, I thought we put out a good effort. We were trying. It’s just getting used to playing together as a team. We had a lot of unforced errors.”
Sophie Fredrickson led the Broncos in kills, but she only had four. Stella Fredrickson added three kills and Sydney Gordon tallied three kills and seven digs. Kara Kennedy added eight digs and eight set assists and Mackenzie Raboin recorded 18 digs.
The Broncos (1-1) return to action today at Tower-Soudan, while the Vikings’ next bit of action is after the holiday weekend on Tuesday at Bigfork.
Match notes
• Shikowsky is still looking for at least one team manager, and would ideally like to have two.
• The starters for both teams were: Broncos — Sara Bacon, Reva Renollet, Kennedy, Sophie Fredrickson, Katie Graves, Gordon and Raboin, the libero. Vikings — Brooke Millerbernd, Paige DeLack, Kari Imhof, Larson, Hell and Gates. L-BF did not play with a libero.
• To view game photos online, visit www.ifallsdailyjournal.smugmug.com
Section 7 results
Barnum def. Cloquet, 19-25, 25-23, 25-22, 22-25, 16-14
Cook County def. Duluth Marshall, 28-26, 25-11, 25-21
Cotton def. Wrenshall, 25-13, 12-25, 25-12, 25-18
Greenway def. Chisholm, 25-17, 25-23, 25-23
Hibbing def. Hermantown, 25-17, 22-25, 21-25, 25-21, 15-12
Mountain Iron-Buhl def. Mesabi East, 25-20, 25-14, 25-16
Superior, Wis. def. Proctor, 25-13, 25-7, 25-12
Virginia def. Duluth Denfeld, 25-13, 25-12, 25-12
Wadena-Deer Creek def. Crosby-Ironton, 25-6, 25-14, 25-15.
