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Bonanza gains valuable experience from trip to Fall Classic bracket final

The Durango Fall Classic has served as one of the premier high school girls volleyball tournaments in the United States for nearly 20 years.

Each year, the tournament not only includes national powerhouses, but also several of Nevada’s top teams.

Its purpose has been to help the local talent gauge exactly where they’re at and where they need to be in order to compete at the highest level.

“The beauty of this tournament is you can see how you match up against better teams,” Bonanza coach Dan Savage said Saturday after his team’s 25-18, 25-22 loss to Liberty (Calif.) in the Character Bracket championship at Foothill.

“We’ve played some high-quality teams and have played decent. The reality is that we saw spurts of really good play this weekend, especially yesterday at Palo Verde.”

Bonanza (9-10) was one of 10 local teams to compete in the 64-team tournament.

The Bengals finished the tournament with a 2-5 record, but Savage was pleased with the way his girls performed against some of the nation’s best.

“We came back and played tough today,” said Savage, whose team went 0-3 in pool play before reaching the Character Bracket championship. “We really wanted to win that championship game, but there were too many unforced errors on our side. It does feel good to at least make it to a championship game, no matter what the bracket. Our kids did fight to get here, so that’s one positive. Now if we can traslate that to league play, we’ll be alright.”

Bonanza was 2-2 Saturday and made it to the bracket final by defeating Green Valley and Galena.

“I feel pretty good (going into league) now,” Savage said. “We definitely have a lot of things that we need to clean up, but we feel really confident in our division this year. Our three captains — Sophie Cram (a BYU commit), Hayley Huntsman and Claire Goodsell — are pretty high-level players, and if they come to play and the supporting staff supports them, we’re going to be tough to beat.”

In total, local teams were 11-48 against non-local squads.

Assmuption (Ky.), ranked No. 14 nationally by Prepvolleyball.com, defeated second-ranked Archbishop Mitty (Calif.) in the tournament championship match, 28-26, 25-18. Ninth-ranked Redondo Union (Calif.) and No. 12 Torrey Pines (Calif.) tied for third.

Coronado was the top Southern Nevada finisher in the tournament, tying for seventh in the Bronze Bracket and for 23rd overall in the tournament. Palo Verde was sixth in the Classic Bracket and 38th overall.

Other Southern Nevada finishers were: Shadow Ridge (44th), Foothill (52nd), Faith Lutheran (tied 55th), Bonanza (58th), Centennial (60th), Arbor View (62nd) and Green Valley and Durango (tied for 63rd).

“I think we’re right there,” Savage said. “We’ve played Shadow, Coronado and Palo, and have competed with all three of them. We’re going to be all right; we have just got to continue to improve and peak at the playoffs. We’ve got a really consistent core. These guys have some experience under their belt, and we’ve had some surprises. We weren’t sure who was going to fill some holes from last year, but some players have stepped up.”

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