Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

Last High spent all of last fall making history in its first season as a varsity program.

One thing the Lightning didn’t do a year ago is claim a tournament championship. It didn’t take long for that to change this season.

Liberty High earned the first tournament title in program history on Saturday going 4-0 at the Charles City Early Bird Invitational.

The Lightning earned wins over Charles City (21-13, 21-14), Decorah (21-7, 21-12), Mason City (21-14, 21-11) and Class 3A third-ranked Iowa Falls (11-21, 21-18, 15-10) on its way to the title.

With its four wins on Saturday Liberty High improved to 4-1 on the season.

LeeAnn Potter had 37 kills, 36 digs and 10 ace serves in the four matches to lead Liberty High.

Sydney Woods had 16 kills, Olivia Slattery added 13 kills and Lauren Roman had 10 kills.

Addie Schmierer had 18 digs, Hailey Hested had 15 digs and led Liberty High with 69 assists while Woods added 14 digs.

Woods had four ace servs while Schmierer and Gabbie Schroeder each had three.

West Branch Wins Home Invite

Abbey Fryauf hammered 31 kills and Kaiya Luneckas had 29 as West Branch won 10 straight sets to claim the title at its own West Branch Invitational on Saturday.

West Branch went 5-0 on Saturday, knocking off Don Bosco 25-12, 25-15 in the title match.

The Bears went 3-0 in pool play defeating Lone Tree (21-6, 21-10), Winfield-Mount Union (21-11, 21-6) and Eddyville-Blakesburg-Fremont 21-18, 21-15.

West Branch downed Regina 25-18, 25-17 in the semifinals before sweeping Don Bosco in the title match.

Mackenzie Heise and Lexi Klinkkammer each had 16 kills for West Branch while Klinkkammer and Courtney Jarrett each had 10 ace serves.

Jarrett had a team-high 23 digs while Riley Vaughan led the Bears with 79 assists.

Fryauf added 13 digs and four ace serves to go with her team-high 31 kills while Luneckas led West Branch with six blocks and added six ace serves and 13 digs.

CCA Goes 4-1 at Grinnell Tournament

Clear Creek Amana went 4-1 and won the Silver Bracket title at the Grinnell Tournament on Saturday.

The Clippers improved to 4-3 on the season with  its 4-1 performance on Saturday.

Class 4A seventh-ranked Clear Creek Amana earned wins over Washington (21-7, 21-8) and East Marshall (21-13, 21-13) in pool play and fell to 4A No. 6 Dallas Center-Grimes (21-17, 21-15).

In silver bracket play Clear Creek Amana defeated South Tama (21-13, 21-16) in the semifinals and downed Norwalk (19-21, 21-15, 15-13) in the championship match.

In the pool play win over Washington Shauntina Williams had six kills while Hailey Pollock added three ace serves and Cheyaenne Bunch had 11 assists.

Calia Clubb had six kills and four ace serves and Pollock had five kills in the win over East Marshall while Bunch had 18 assists and five ace serves.  

In the loss to Dallas Center-Grimes Williams led the Clippers with seven kills while Clubb had four kills and Bunch had 14 assists.

In the Silver Bracket title match Clubb led Clear Creek Amana with 11 kills and Williams added seven kills.

Bunch had 23 assists in the win and Jordan Neely had 12 digs.