By CURTIS ROCKWELL/Sports Director

GAUTIER — Visiting Vancleave completed the first round of action in Region 4-5A play in fine fashion Tuesday night.
The Lady Bulldogs, under the direction of second-year head coach Tyler Denmark, remained perfect in league play at 5-0 so far with a 3-0 clean sweep of home-standing Gautier Tuesday night. Vancleave won 25-17, 25-15, 25-13. The Lady Bulldogs now begin the second half of the home-and-home region race in search of their first region title since last winning the state championship in 2021.
“I’m proud of this team, they compete each set to get better,” Denmark, whose team sits at 10-5 overall, said. “We are focused on playing good volleyball on our side of the net, by limiting our service errors and attack errors, and we did a good job of not committing unforced errors tonight.”

Vancleave got seven kills apiece from Aniya Tapper and McKenzie Wharton in the latest win, while Tapper added three service aces. Ava Drake recorded 21 assists in the winning effort.
The Lady Bulldogs were coming off a win late last week over yet another Jackson County rival with a 3-1 home win over defending region champs East Central Thursday.
The Lady Hornets actually won the first game 27-25, before Vancleave stormed back to take the next three games 25-14, 25-18 and 25-23 to secure the match.
In that match, Tapper had eight kills and Presleigh Tapp added seven kills while Bernadette Schroder registered five service aces while Tapper and Drake had four apiece. Mahea Hawthorne tallied five total blocks and Drake had 27 assists. Harlie Lott recorded 15 digs and Schroder was also in double digits in that department with 11.

The one set that Vancleave dropped to East Central is the lone blemish on the region slate so far for the Lady Bulldogs as they swept Stone, Laurel, Wayne County and then Gautier all by that same 3-0 outcome.
Vancleave begins the second round of match-ups in Region 4-5A action hosting Laurel Thursday night. In the first encounter between these two squads, the Lady Bulldogs dominated the Golden Tornadoes 25-5, 25-9 and 25-6 on the road.
Elsewhere in the region standings, East Central bounced back from the loss last week to VHS with a 3-0 sweep on the road of that Laurel squad to move back into sole possession of the second spot at 4-1. Gautier dropped to third place at 3-2 with the loss to VHS, and Wayne County vaulted into the all important fourth spot with a 3-0 sweep of Stone. That left the Tomcats in fifth place at 1-4, while Laurel holds down the cellar at 0-5.
The top four seeds will qualify for the Class 5A South State playoffs.