Tribe impressive in league opener

BURROUGHS HIGH — Glendale and Burroughs high’s girls’ volleyball teams opened the Pacific League season in head-to-head competition on Tuesday, with each resembling the form in which they finished the 2008 season.

In thrashing the Nitros, 25-4, 25-13, 25-8, at Burroughs, the Indians look like the team that finished second in league last season and hopes to contend strongly this year.

“We wanted to come out strong and make a little statement to the rest of the teams in the league and you do it by winning,” said Burroughs Coach Edwin Real, whose Indians were led by 10 kills from sophomore Kathy Henry. “[League’s] gonna be competitive and you’ve got to come out every match.”

Glendale, which did not qualify for the playoffs last year, meanwhile, looked very much like a team that’s got little in the way of experienced returners and much to do in terms of getting up to speed with the varsity game.

“We need to work on our passing, service-receive, of course, and just playing a lot smarter,” second-year Glendale Coach Jennifer Vo said. “We’re still having a little trouble playing as a team, but I think it will come along eventually.”

The first game was over in the blink of an eye, as Burroughs jumped out to a 12-3 lead on three straight aces from libero Traci Hamanaka and made just one hitting error the rest of the way.

Glendale was able to hang around in the second game, partly because the Indians’ committed seven service errors.

“I thought we served well in Game One,” said Real, who got five kills from Megan Stephenson and five aces from Hamanaka. “We really kept them from running much. We kind of faltered in Game Two, but in Game Three we came back pretty strong. It was good to see.”

Ninette Mirzakhanian and April Reed each notched kills for Glendale (0-1) in the early stages of the third game to help keep the Nitros close at 9-5, but Burroughs (3-5) then hastened the outcome with a 9-1 run that included two Henry kills.