Cinco Ranch has been in big moments before.

The Cougars have played in almost every big game you can play in on the high school state. They have been under the brightest lights against the best competition in high school volleyball, they’ve taken punches and bounced back against top teams and they’ve learned how to win in adverse conditions.

So a third round playoff game against another district champion, for the Cougars that’s just another game and Cinco Ranch’s (35-5) poise showed on Tuesday as the Cougars swept past Ridge Point (36-12) in the Class 6A-Division I Regional Semifinals (25-17, 25-19, 25-19) to reach the regional finals for the third straight season.

“It’s a great feeling,” said senior outside hitter Addison Goertz. “We have been working so hard for this and it shows with the results on the floor. You can see it paying off and that’s all you can ask for as a player. I love this feeling.”

Cinco Ranch fell behind in the first set 10-6, but immediately turned things around, bringing the game back to a tie at 13. The Cougars took control from their and won the set 25-17, before leading wire to wire in the second set and winning 25-19.

Things got trickier in the third set as Ridge Point fought to keep its season alive. The Cougars built a lead, but every time they would create some distance, Ridge Point would answer back and trim that lead or tie the game. Things stayed that way all throughout the set, but towards the end Cinco finally started to pull away and they clinched the win and the sweep with a 25-19 third set victory.”

“The mindset for us is just one set at a time and that never changes,” said sophomore middle blocker Rahima Kone. “It’s all about what we can control, fighting as hard as we can and not getting down on ourselves. We have so many seniors who have set that standard and it makes it easy to follow.”

Kone and Goertz were both huge parts of the win. Kone did a tremendous job of controlling the middle and making plays when her number was called, while Goertz was tremendous in serve receive and put away a number of kills for the Cougars. But it wasn’t just those two. It was a complete team effort and one that the entire team was a part of.

“We have a tremendous libero (Magdalene Finnegan) who comes in and helps with our setter and even more than that, our backcourt, no matter who is back there, they all have good ball control and get the ball to someone that can hit it,” said Cinco Ranch head coach Danielle Wells. “We just have so many girls who will all go out there and get the job done when asked. And Rahima did a tremendous job against their power outside hitters in the middle.”

Cinco Ranch advances to play Fulshear in the regional final in what will be one of the Cougars biggest tests of the year. But for these players, it isn’t anything new and they know they have the talent to get the job done.

“We have to come out and play our best volleyball, it is going to be a really good match,” Wells said. “We just have to stay in our serve-receive and be smart. We don’t have to be perfect, we just have to be smart with our decisions We did a great job of that tonight and we just have to do that again against Fulshear.”

Jordan falls to Shadow Creek

Jordan fell in four sets to Shadow Creek on Tuesday (25-16, 24-16, 25-19, 25-20) in the regional semifinals of Class 6A-Division II to bring the Warriors season to an end.

The Warriors dropped the first set of the match before bouncing back and taking a second set that was a thriller, Shadow Creek proved to be too much down the stretch though and took the final two sets to close the match out.

Jordan’s season ends with a 22-20 record as the Warriors went the furthest they have in school history by reaching the third round.