PIRATE VOLLEYBALL TAKES FOURTH PLACE AT CROOKSTON INVITATIONAL

The Crookston Pirate Volleyball team hosted the Crookston Invitational on Saturday and they split their four matches taking fourth place. The other seven participating teams were Clearbrook-Gonvick, Climax-Fisher, Northome-Kelliher, Bagley, Stephen-Argyle, East Grand Forks, and Warroad. “As the day went on we got pretty tired after Homecoming week and the dance last night so we were pretty tired by the end of it,” explained Pirates Head Coach Katie Engelstad.

Crookston vs. Climax-Fisher
The Pirates played in the one of the two matches right away at 9:00 am against Climax-Fisher and were able to come away with a 2-0 victory (25-21, 25-22). “It is always pretty competitive and we came out swinging,” said Coach Engelstad. “I think Climax-Fisher started playing better as the day went on so we are glad we played them right away.”

	1	2
Climax-Fisher	21	22
Crookston	25	25

Crookston vs. Clearbrook-Gonvick
Crookston took on the Bears and they lost in two sets (25-19, 25-22). Crookston made an attempt at a late rally in set two, but it came up short. “They are a tough team and it shows with them playing for the top spot today,” said Coach Engelstad. “I thought we played well against them.”

	1	2
Clearbrook-Gonvick	25	25
Crookston	19	22

Crookston vs. Northome-Kelliher
Crookston lost its first set of the day against the Mustangs. The Pirates bounced back to win set two and force a third set. However, Northome-Kelliher won the third set to win the match 2-1 (25-17, 21-25, 15-13). “I think out girls kind of weren’t really here. We have talked about that all year so we have to keep working on our mental game,” explained Coach Engelstad. “I know the girls were tired with everything going on but we have to be able to switch gears.” The Pirates still solidified their spot as the second seed in Pool A. They will play the Stephen-Argyle Storm who took second place in Pool B.

	1	2	3
Northome-Kelliher	25	21	15
Crookston	17	25	13

Crookston vs. Stephen-Argyle
Stephen-Argyle won the match in two sets (25-9, 25-12). The Storm started strong in the first set with a 14-2 run to propel them to a 25-9 win. “We just weren’t there for this last match of the day,” added Coach Engelstad. Similarly, in the second set, Stephen-Argyle started on a 16-3 run and the teams played even the rest of the way for a 25-12 set win for the Storm. “I wrote the wrong lineup for the second set, but we rolled with it to see how the girls reacted to that,” said Coach Engelstad. “We tried some different things today with some many sets and it was fun to see some girls play in some different positions.”