Honkers win Silver Bracket at Red Bluff tournament

A strong performance in the Red Bluff Invitational Volleyball Tournament earned Willows High the Silver Bracket championship.

The Honkers defeated Yreka in three sets 25-17, 26-27, 15-4 in the championship game after winning their pool on Saturday.

Willows held the net with 12 blocks, four by Megan Hughes, three by Colleen Tade and three by Erica Click. The Honkers nailed 41 kills in the match with Tade's 10 leading the way, nine by Mary Feeney and eight by Hughes.

"We played 13 games that week," coach Carol Martin said. "They were exhausted so I was pretty happy with the outcome because I was thinking at any time they were going to die on me because we played as many games as we did."

The tournament opened Friday with pool play and Willows had an unforgiving draw against larger schools in Enterprise, West Valley and Corning.

Facing a hard-hitting team for the second time this year, the Honkers struggled against West Valley, losing 25-16, 25-16.

Willows put up a tough fight against Enterprise High but lost 25-19, 25-21. Feeney led the Honkers with nine kills and Hughes made six digs.

"I was shocked at how well we played against (Enterprise), they're a good team," Martin said. "So far we haven't had too many teams hit at us as much as West Valley and Enterprise."

The Honkers salvaged a third place in the pool by beating Corning 25-17, 25-7. The Honkers used a balanced attack with everyone getting involved to topple the Cardinals.

On the second day of the tournament Willows moved on to a pool of teams which finished in third place in their respective pools on Friday.

Willows defeated Los Molinos High 25-17, 25-18 and edged Redding Christian in the first match 25-16, 27-26. Hughes was dominant at the net with six kills, two blocks and came up with nine digs against Redding Christian.

The Honkers followed that win up with a 25-15, 25-11 win against Fall River. Seven different Honkers had an ace and eight came up with at least one kill.

Sam Brott and Tade gave Willows a boost with eight and seven kills, respectively, in a 25-17, 21-25 and 15-4 victory against Durham to advance to the championship game. Taylor Femino blocked two shots in the match.

Martin credited Ally Brunner, Feeney and Tade for having a great tournament.

"I would have liked to play better against West Valley but I was happy how we beat everyone else after that," Martin said.

Willows (13-4) won't have much time to rest as they played Gridley on Tuesday and host Sutter on Thursday.