Sep. 7—THOMASVILE — On Tuesday evening, Thomas County Central's volleyball team took on Cook County as they celebrated their seniors. The night started off with the JV game and the Yellow Jackets took care of business.

"Junior varsity, I think, was clearly the better team just from start to finish. It was a very easy win for them," said TCC head coach Lisa Guyton. "They did a really good job of communicating with each other and finishing on plays."

The night then transitioned into a celebration filled with cheers and tears as the volleyball team honored their seniors. Four girls, Samantha Jennings, Alex Poppell, Railey Ramhofer, and Kirsten Guyton, walked through a tunnel of their teammates as they were honored for their commitment to the volleyball team.

"When you have girls who are very serious about the sport, it makes other ones want to work harder," Guyton said. "So, when you have that level of competition then other girls are saying, 'hey, maybe I need to be playing club ball, or maybe I need to start playing a little bit more if this is something I want to do in college.' And these girls, they are good kids, they are nice people and other girls want to be around them and want to do things that they do and that is huge. That goes further than anything else."

Guyton also talked about how rewarding it is to watch these seniors grow. This is the first group of seniors Guyton has coached from freshmen to seniors and she talked about the growth she's seen from Ramhofer. Ramhofer was unsure of herself as a freshman according to Guyton, but has dedicated herself to the sport, even playing club volleyball outside of school. On Tuesday night, she had 10 kills and was one of the best players on the court.

Following the celebration, the Yellow Jackets proved just how good they are.

They started off slow as a lack of communication cost them the first game against Cook County, who won 25-14.

But Central bounced back, and took the next three matches 25-19, 25-23, and 25-14, sealing their victory.

"We started out poorly. We weren't communicating, we weren't playing as a team, and we were not making smart plays and through the course of the matches you could see that that was developing. They were covering well, they were moving well together," Guyton said. "By the fourth match, the put aways were there, the kills were there, we had more heads up plays."

Cook County was making predictable moves that made it easy for the Yellow Jackets to defend while Central was able to do just the opposite.

"We talk about looking for the holes before you make the shot or knowing where those holes are early," said Guyton. "They were finding those. So, that changes games when you have another team constantly thinking about where you're going to put the ball."

Thomas County Central's next game will be on Monday as they travel just down the road to take on Thomasville High School. JV will start at 5:00 p.m. while varsity will begin at 6:00p.m.