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Sebring falls to familiar foe

Mark Pinson/Highlands Today

Sebring's Courteny Cleghorn (14) goes up for the block on a spike by Okeechobee's Sarah Davis as Blue Streak Anna West looks on during Thursday night's Preseason Classic final.

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By RYAN LAVNER

Highlands Today

Published: August 29, 2009

Updated:

SEBRING - Blue Streaks coach Venessa Sinness figures her team hasn't beaten Okeechobee in more than a decade.

The way the Brahmans played Thursday, that streak doesn't appear to be in jeopardy anytime soon.

Sebring lost to powerhouse Okeechobee 13-25, 20-25, 25-18 and 17-25 in the finals of the Preseason Classic, sending the Blue Streaks into the regular season with something to prove.

And that, Sinness said, it's necessarily a bad thing.

"This is definitely incentive for us," she said. "It's good for them to see our potential and how we could be so good without those mental breakdowns."

This wasn't two teams slogging through a meaningless preseason game. Quite the contrary, actually.

This had all the makings of a district playoff game - with the boisterous crowd, the rhythmic transitions and the shifts in momentum.

It just didn't have the end result the Blue Streaks wanted.

"Our lack of communication hurt us in the end," Sinness said. "When all six girls aren't together it's easy to break down. And you need to communicate well with six people in a small area."

Sinness recalls when Sebring last played Okeechobee three years ago. Even then, there was a lack of on-court communication.

In 2006, in the midst of another Okeechobee victory, Anna West (who is now a senior) collided with former setter Ashley Waldon. West suffered a concussion. Waldon needed 32 stitches to close a gash on her forehead, which later required plastic surgery.

Fortunately for the Blue Streaks, this breakdown didn't have nearly the same consequences.

"There wasn't enough talking tonight on the court," said senior Brittanie Augustine, who finished with four kills, five blocks and 12 digs to lead the team in nearly every statistical category. "We need to focus on that more during practices."

Sebring did well in that department in the third set, winning 25-18 to extend the match.

But in the decisive fourth set, the Blue Streaks countered each punishing blow with one of its own, until its string of well-positioned serves went wide, and its blocks at the net fell short.

Okeechobee led 12-5 in the fourth set before Sinness called a timeout to regroup, her team's chances of claiming the preseason title on its home floor slipping away.

Okeechobee then rattled off five straight points, pushing its lead to 12, but Sebring sent a jolt through the crowd with a rousing 45-second volley at 18-10, and three more points cut the deficit to five, 18-13.

The rally, it turns out, was short-lived.

Okeechobee settled into a groove, crushing the ball into the holes in the defense before a final block at the net sealed the win.

"I think we did well," Augustine said. "There's a lot that we've got to work on, but it'll come together with time."

After a back-and-forth battle in the second set, Okeechobee surged ahead with six straight points late - and seven points in eight possessions - to take the lead, 24-19. The Brahmans closed it out with a powerful kill shot that grazed off a Blue Streaks defender and flew into the backcourt, untouched.

Ryan Lavner can be reached at 863-386-5841 or rlavner@highlandstoday.com

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