SPORTS

GFH and CMR spikers to meet

Grady Higgins
ghiggins@greatfallstribune.com

A mere two points separated victory from defeat in the last crosstown clash between the Great Falls High and the C.M. Russell volleyball teams.

So, it’s safe to say that tensions will be running high when the Bison and Rustlers face off again Tuesday at 7 p.m. at Swarthout Fieldhouse.

The Rustlers squeaked out a victory in the fifth set on Sept. 29 at the CMR Fieldhouse. GFH junior middle hitter Sarah Dutro said the Bison are going into the game with retribution in mind.

“It is a revenge game,” Dutro said. “It sucks that we lost by two points (in the previous match up). It was a tight, very competitive game last time and I would love to take home a win and split with them for the season.”

CMR senior Kierstin Evenson said the Rustlers need to be focused because they know the Bison are going to be very motivated.

“(The Bison) are definitely going to come firing,” Evenson said. “We have to make sure we come ready and work together as a team and we’ll come out on top.”

GFH head coach Katherine Sunwall said the rowdy environment at CMR in the last match affected the Bison a bit.

“We’re a young team and that environment was a little too much for us,” Sunwall said. “But we’ve learned from it and have been preparing for them. I felt like we were just two points away from it and it could’ve gone either way and both teams played hard. We’re ready to go.”

The Rustlers have won three games in a row dating back to their victory over GFH. CMR head coach Theresa Besich said the Rustlers have been focusing on improving each match.

“We just talked about every game getting a little better,” Besich said. “We’re setting goals every day and every game and we’re meeting those goals so that’s a good feeling for us.”

Sunwall said the Bison need to clean up the mistakes that plagued them in the last crosstown game.

“Last game I thought we played hard but at times we didn’t play smart enough,” Sunwall said. “We had a lot of errors. We had 23 errors and 18 serving errors. We’re working on capitalizing on taking care of the free balls and also taking of our side and minimizing errors.”

Evenson said the Rustlers have some areas they need to improve on if they want to sweep the season regular season series against GFH.

“The biggest thing we need to do in this game is get more serves,” Evenson said. “That was a pretty rough point last time so if we improve that I think we’ll be really well off.”

Dutro said the Bison have been emphasizing defense in practice.

“We’ve been working on defense a lot because they have some strong hitters up front,” Dutro said. “We have to dig as best as we can and play really tight on the net.”

Besich said the crosstown match is always exciting because both teams get a good turnout from their fans no matter what gym the game takes place at.

“I think with your own gym you have that little bit of an edge,” Besich said. “We treat it as an away game but it’s usually a good crowd which is great for both schools.”