Playing at home for the first time this season led to some early nerves for the Powell Panther volleyball team, which battled through a match against the Rocky Mountain Grizz to earn a 3-0 sweep Tuesday night.

POWELL 3, ROCKY MOUNTAIN 0

(25-22, 25-20, 25-15)

After three weekends on the road the Panthers (14-4-1) finally got a chance to play in front of the home crowd, which led to struggles early against the visiting Grizz (5-9-3).

Those struggles primarily came in the form of Panther serving, which struggled consistently throughout the night.

That led to a strong start for Rocky, as the visitors held a 13-9 lead and forced a Panther timeout.

“We talked about focusing on what we could control on our side, and there’s lots of things that we had to work on there,” coach Anna Flitner said. “Again week after week we emphasize the mental piece of it, because we tend to get in ruts and we get down. We’re really working on not having that.”

Powell worked its way back into the contest, but continued to trail 16-15 as Rocky took a timeout.

The Panthers took the lead 18-17, before the two teams went back and forth before a Grizz timeout with Powell leading 22-21.

Powell saw out the rest of the set to earn a 25-22 win.

The Panthers started stronger in the second set and held an early 12-6 lead before a timeout by the visitors.

Powell maintained that margin until 20-14, before a small run late allowed the Grizz to close the final scoreline to 25-20 in the second set.

The third set saw another strong start by the Panthers, who led 11-6 before a Grizz timeout.

Rocky made a small push to 13-9 and forced a Powell timeout.

Powell found a way to make a final push, and earned a 25-15 third set win to complete the sweep.

“We tried a different lineup tonight than we have in the past, just to see what it would be like,” Flitner said. “I think it threw the girls off a little bit; I think it can be effective in the future, but trying that for the first time also probably threw them off. They all had some first home game jitters that [also] showed up.”

Catelynn Floy led the Panthers with 11 kills, just ahead of Saige Kidd and Addison Holcomb with nine each.

Ava Teten had 13 assists and Peyton Borcher recorded 12.

Holcomb led with eight digs, and Alexa Richardson led with four aces, just ahead of Holcomb and Kidd who each had three.

Kodee Asay led with one block while Kidd and Kaedenze Carter each had half a block.

Service errors proved to be one of the biggest factors on the night for the Panthers, as the team recorded 17 in three sets.

“The girls easily get in their heads sometimes,” Flitner said. “Serving can be a very mental thing, and I think that it’s just a one night thing, we can bounce back from that. That’s more serves than we missed the entire tournament in Rawlins, and we missed that many in one set.”

FIRST CONFERENCE GAME

Powell now turns its attention to the first conference game of the season, taking on Worland (3-6) at 6 tonight (Thursday).

The Panthers defeated the Warriors this past weekend at the Sandy Jebins Invitational in Rawlins, and will be looking to improve before the first conference match.

“We’re going to be working on serving for sure,” Flitner said. “We’ll [also] probably be talking about more mental stuff because it is more mental than physical at this point.”

POWELL 3, ROCKY MOUNTAIN 0

(25-22, 25-20, 25-15)

Total blocks the solo blocks in ()

Kills — Catelynn Floy 11, Saige Kidd 9, Addison Holcomb 9, Kodee Asay 4, Kaedenze Carter 3, Leah Graham 2, Peyton Borcher 1, Ava Teten 1

Assists — Ava Teten 13, Peyton Borcher 12, Leah Graham 6, Alexa Richardson 4, Saige Kidd 1, Kaedenze Carter 1, Kodee Asay 1

Digs — Addison Holcomb 8, Alexa Richardson 5, Leah Graham 4, Ava Teten 4, Peyton Borcher 3, Catelynn Floy 3, Kaedenze Carter 2, Saige Kidd 1, Kodee Asay 1

Blocks — Kodee Asay 1, Saige Kidd .5, Kaedenze Carter .5

Aces — Alexa Richardson 4, Saige Kidd 3, Addison Holcomb 3, Catelynn Floy 2, Ava Teten 2