The Bingham Miners will face off against the Corner Canyon Chargers at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday. Each of these teams will be fighting to keep a win streak alive as Bingham comes in on 12 and Corner Canyon on four.
Bingham is coming in fresh off a high-stakes matchup with another one of Utah's top teams: Herriman, who was ranked seventh at the time (Bingham was ranked second). The Miners put the hurt on the Mustangs with a sharp 3-0 win on Tuesday.
Bingham's got stronger as the match went on, holding Herriman to fewer and fewer points set over set. The final score came out to 25-22, 25-21, 25-19.
Bingham can attribute much of their success to Derek Peterson, who had seven digs and two aces, and Spencer Smith, who had 13 digs and one assist. That's the most aces Peterson has posted over his last five matchups.
Meanwhile, Corner Canyon beat Copper Hills 3-1 on Tuesday.
Corner Canyon had a slow start but a hot finish: after dropping the first set, they turned around to win the next three. Once all was said and done, the final score wound up at 20-25, 25-21, 25-18, 25-21.
Bingham's victory was their sixth straight at home dating back to last season, which pushed their record up to 19-4. As for Corner Canyon, their win bumped their record up to 12-6.
Here's a few offensive stats to keep an eye on ahead of Thursday's contest: Bingham has really dialed in their serving this season, having averaged 5 aces per game. However, it's not like Corner Canyon struggles in that department as they've been averaging 6.2 aces. Given these competing strengths, it'll be interesting to see how their clash plays out.
Bingham came out on top in a nail-biter against Corner Canyon in their previous meeting back in April, sneaking past 3-2. Will the Miners repeat their success, or do the Chargers have a new game plan this time around? We'll find out soon enough.
