The Toccoa Falls College volleyball team got back on track last week winning two out of three close matches, bringing their season record to 2-2. Other TFC teams didn’t fare as well in the second week of competition.
TFC hosted the volleyball team from Piedmont College on Sept. 1. While each game was close and the teams exchanged several leads, the smaller Lady Eagles, playing without their tallest player (senior Allison Gibson, out for the year with a knee injury), could not take a game from Piedmont, losing 25-20, 25-19 and 25-18. Bethany Slate had 13 kills and 22 digs in the match. Setter Mary Willis had 23 assists.
The Lady Eagles traveled to Hickory, North Carolina to play Davidson Community College and Catawba Community College. Davidson won the first game 21-25, but the Lady Eagles dominated the second game 25-15 and built enough momentum to win the next two close games, 25-22 and 26-24 to take the match. Slate had 17 kills for the match, and Kayla Peters added 11. Slate led a scrappy defensive attack with 4.5 blocks and was one of four players with double-digit digs. Willis had 36 assists.
Next they played Catawba who won the first game 25-17. The Lady Eagles then traded points and games with Catawba, winning game two (25-23), losing game three (25-22), winning game four convincingly (25-20) and then putting away game five and the match, 15-13. Slate had 17 kills, four blocks, and 27 digs. Kayla Peters had 11 kills and Caroline Johnson had 13 digs. Mary Willis had 35 assists.
TFC hosts the North/South Shootout this weekend starting at 5:00 pm on Sept 9.
The TFC cross-country team ran in its first race of the season at the North Georgia Tech Cross-Country Invitational. While neither the men’s or women’s teams finished in the top three, both teams were led by runners who finished third in their field. TFC junior Ben Pigott, finished 3rdwith a time of 30:40 for the men’s 8K course and freshman Clessie Kendrick finished 3rd in the women’s 5k with a time of 22:56. Alisha Carlson finished in 12th place for TFC, and Sam Burnett finished 16th for TFC in the men’s race.
The men’s soccer team (3-1) traveled to Henderson, Tennessee for two games hosted by NAIA Freed-Hardeman University. On Sept. 2, the Eagles lost to the hosts 5-0 at night. Freed-Hardeman piled on four goals in the first half, three of those coming during a defensive lapse in the last ten minutes of the half. TFC held them to only one goal in the second half. As much as he wasn’t happy with the late first half goals, Head Coach Rob Worsley saw some defensive progress. You wouldn’t know it from the score, but our back four really started figuring some things out in the second half of that game, he said.
Though TFC did give up a goal in the seventh minute of the next day’s game against Johnson University, they shut Johnson out the rest of the way and took advantage of scoring opportunities of their own and won 5-1. Logan Ferrell tied the game and then former Stephens County stand-out Josh Gailer scored on a penalty kick to put TFC up 2-1 at the half. The Eagles continued the offensive pressure in the second half which led to an own-goal by Johnson, and a goal each from Tyler Timberlake and Mike Howell.
The women’s soccer team (2-1) lost at home to LaGrange College 5-0 on Sept. 1. While the score appears lopsided, the game was competitive. LaGrange converted their five goals off only 12 shots on goal. TFC had 11 shots on goal and missed them all, but hit the crossbar twice and the post twice. Despite the goals allowed, Head Coach Doug Howell was pleased with the defense effort of the team.
