FORT WORTH — The Denton Lady Broncos entered Tuesday’s season finale against Saginaw Boswell with a chance to force a three-way tie for first place in District 5-5A.
Denton needed to defeat Boswell, which has dominated the Lady Broncos, including an opening-round playoff loss a year ago.
Fighting back to force a fourth set, the Lady Broncos couldn’t find enough offensive accuracy and fell 25-15, 25-11, 22-25, 25-16.
“We took a set from them, which was nice,” Denton coach Danielle Kading said.” We’ve played them three times, and each time we’ve taken them to four sets. Boswell is definitely a quality team. They had three hitters available to them at all times. It’s frustrating because we’ve beaten other quality teams. We couldn’t execute what we’ve been working on. It’s frustrating because we’re a quality team.”
The Lady Pioneers (32-8, 13-1 district) shot out to a 12-4 lead in the first set, but Denton awoke with a 6-2 run to climb back to within 14-10. Boswell answered with a 6-0 run to truncate the Lady Broncos’ momentum.
A Denton ace gave it a 7-4 lead to start the second set, but Boswell finished the set on an 11-2 run.
Kading said that Boswell’s offensive attack was spread out, which threw a kink into her coaching.
“They hit everywhere and run their offense every way,” Kading said. “The first time we played them, they set two specific players the entire game. Tonight, they were serving everybody. That wasn’t fun. You just don’t know where the ball is going to go. They were stacking on our go-to players, and they didn’t have a go-to.”
Down two sets to none, the Lady Broncos found their legs and gutted out a 25-22 third-set victory after shooting out to an 8-2 lead. The Lady Pioneers fought back to tie it at 15, but Denton found its groove and answered with a 5-1 run to secure a lead it was able to hold, forcing the fourth set.
Dentn’s Jade Akins, who had 16 kills, had seven in a third set that Kading said represented her team.
“We had positive hitting percentage,” Kading said. “We were actually hitting into the court and putting balls down. The second set, I think everybody was in a negative percentage except for one person, so the third set was good. For some reason, when everything is on the line, that’s when for some reason we figure it out. It’s happened several times.”
Playing to an 8-all tie to start the fourth set, the Lady Broncos fell behind 13-10 but came back to tie the game at 14.
That’s when Boswell turned on the jets and closed out the set on an 11-2 run to secure the 25-16 win and the outright district championship.
The third-place Lady Broncos (27-10, 11-3), whose loss to Wichita Falls Rider on Oct. 21 put them into third after being tied for first nearly all season, will face former district rival Lake Dallas next Tuesday at Argyle in the bi-district round of the playoffs, at a time yet to be determined.
“[Lake Dallas coach Heather Van Noy] has a different team than she did last year,” Kading said. “I think it will be fun to play a crosstown rival. We always get pumped playing them. I’m not really sure what to expect from them. I know they have good players. I feel like we’ve had a tough preseason and district season that have prepared us for it.”
PATRICK HAYSLIP can be reached at 940-566-6873 and via Twitter at @PatrickHayslip.
