Lady Panthers hit the road to defeat Hayden

RANGELY I Playing a road game against a league opponent can sometimes be a recipe for disaster.
Or not.
“We played great,” Rangely volleyball coach Jimmie Mergelman said about last Friday’s three-set win at Hayden. “We played the best we’ve played yet.”
Which is saying something.
Two weeks ago, Rangely also beat Hayden, but it took the Lady Panthers five games to get the job done.
That wasn’t the case the second time around.
“Everything went well,” Mergel-man said of most-recent match against Hayden. “Every aspect of the game, I thought we did a great job. Everybody clicked.”
The scores in Rangely’s win against Hayden were 25-21, 25-14 and 25-13.
Following the victory at Hayden, the Lady Panthers hosted Plateau Valley and again won in three games: 25-18, 25-22 and 25-13.
The Lady Panthers’ only loss this season came against Class 5A Grand Junction High School in the season-opening tournament at Glenwood Springs.
Since then, Rangely has been on a roll.
Last weekend’s wins improved Rangely’s overall record to 13-1, 7-0 in the Western Slope League.
This week, the Lady Panthers will host county rival Meeker on Friday in a league match. They follow that up against another league opponent, Paonia, on Saturday in what will be the final regular-season home match.
Friday’s match against rival Meeker takes on even more significance because its homecoming for Rangely.
Mergelman is hoping the Lady Panthers will have a repeat of their performance last Friday against Hayden.
“It is big,” the Rangely coach said. “It’s big, no matter what. Hopefully we’ll come out and play like we did against Hayden. I think we’ll be fine. Now that we know we can play that well, I hope we can continue doing that. We talked about that Saturday after the game that we can’t let up now.”
Times for this weekend’s matches are 4 p.m. Friday for junior varsity and C team and 5 p.m. for varsity. Then on Saturday, game times are noon, 1 p.m. and 2 p.m.