Choctaw and Fort Walton Beach met on the volleyball court for the fourth time this season Wednesday night, this time in the first round of the playoffs. The Lady Indians won 3-1, but once again, it wasn’t easy.
“Fort Walton came to play tonight,” Choctaw Head Coach Andy Faulkner said.
Behind stellar play from Tishelle Bowles, Choctaw built a strong lead in the first set, only to see it slip away as errors began to mount. Adelle Howsden then took over with two straight kills, and Fort Walton Beach won the set 25-23.
At that point, it appeared the Lady Vikings would get retribution for Friday’s district championship loss.
Second set
The second set began with both teams going back and forth before the Lady Indians built a lead behind Bowles and Gabriella Blackstock. But Mya Divens soon went on a tear of her own, tying the set and putting the Lady Vikings in front.
Choctaw rebounded from there. Blackstock got a kill to stop the run, and the Lady Indians began to pull away. Anyiah Boyd and Triniti Carswell answered with kills for Fort Walton Beach, but a kill from Annabeth Bexley, a block from Khloe Brockett and a Lady Vikings error gave Choctaw the set 25-21, along with the momentum.
“If you keep hitting the ball out of bounds, you can lose to anybody. We had a 5-point lead and we hit like three and four balls out of bounds, and Fort Walton made a couple plays,” Faulkner said.
“We just didn’t start off as strong as we usually do, but we came back,” Bowles added.
- “It was really just our mistakes. We just came back and fixed what we needed to fix,” Bexley said.
Third & Fourth set
Choctaw opened the third set on a 4-1 run behind a kill from Bexley. Fort Walton Beach clawed back into it, but Bexley and Bowles sparked another run as Choctaw took the set and a 2-1 match lead.
Bexley opened the fourth set with two straight kills, and Bowles, Blackstock and Brockett did the rest. Bowles and Bexley went on tears down the stretch as the Lady Indians won the set 25-11 to close out the match.
- “Tishelle played great tonight. AB, she’s a warrior. She’s been an amazing addition to our team this year,” Faulkner said.
Choctaw will now travel to Arnold on Saturday. Arnold advanced with a 3-0 sweep of Booker T. Washington and beat Choctaw 3-1 when the teams met Oct. 1 at Choctaw.
“We lost to Arnold a few weeks ago, so we’re going to get to work,” Faulkner said.
“We have lost to Arnold a few times, but the more we practice and watch film over tomorrow and Friday, we’ll be able to come out with the win,” Bowles said.
“We’re just going to play our hardest that we can,” Bexley added.
“Special” would be an understatement for the Vikings
For Fort Walton Beach, the loss does not overshadow a season for which “special” would be an understatement. The Lady Vikings posted their first winning record since 2019 and earned their first playoff berth since 2020.
They also lose only one key contributor in Divens, as Howsden, Boyd, Carswell, Zaire Porter and Hadley Maynard will all be back in 2027.
