Wildcats Survive Three-Setter Against West Side
LEE, Mass. – After pulling out a two-point win in the second set on Tuesday, the Lee volleyball team found itself trailing West Springfield, 12-10, in the third.
A lot of coaches would have called a timeout to stem a three-point run by the Terriers.
But Wildcats coach Julia Warner went the other way, and her team rewarded her with a 25-16, 26-24, 25-20 win for Lee’s second straight victory and fourth in its last five outings.
Karalynn Hopkins had a double-double with 10 kills and 10 digs, and Juliana Schuerer passed out 23 assists.
Mya Andre delivered a block for a sideout at 11-12, and Alexis Masten (eight kills, 14 digs) delivered a kill off the block to tie the third set at 12; West Side never led by more than a point the rest of the way.
“It is always a little bit of a calculated risk of letting them figure it out on their own versus calling a timeout just to take a break and get a break in the play,” Warner said of her decision. “In that moment, I elected to just let them play it out and figure it out on their own, and they were able to do that.”
She said that the Wildcats have been preparing for just that kind of situation.
“We’ve been talking a lot about mental toughness and the mental part of the game, being able to shake off errors and saying, ‘Next ball,’ to each other,” she said. “I never ask them for perfection. They’re going to make errors. It’s, ‘What do we do after that?’ that is the most important part.”
A Shayla Santolin kill and a Masten kill on back-to-back points gave Lee a 16-14 lead in the deciding set. West Side continued to hang around until Schuerer (four aces, five digs) served out the match with three straight points, the last on a kill from Masten.
Back in the first set, it looked like Lee would run away with the match.
A four-point run on Santolin’s serve gave the Wildcats their first significant lead at 8-3. A four-point run on Schuerer’s serve put Lee up by six at 16-10.
The hosts grew their lead gradually to the end, winning by nine points.
Lee then grabbed a 9-3 advantage early in the second on a kill by Hopkins and went up by nine points on a Santolin kill at 18-9.
But West Springfield’s Hannah Debian took over the set from there, repeatedly blocking Lee’s attack – including twice on a five-point run on Nahla Williams’ serve that trimmed the lead to 21-17.
Another Debian block made it 23-21, and she served two points, including an ace, to tie the set at 24-24.
“[Debian] is a very big middle,” Warner said. “She’s a huge presence at the net, and that’s something we struggled a little bit with. We were able to figure it out in the end and convert into some good offense.”
A West Side free ball that went wide gave the Wildcats a side out at 25-24, and Masten’s kill on the serve of libero Autumn Schwab (15 digs) ended the set.
West Springfield was able to carry a little bit of momentum into the third, though, and grabbed that 12-10 lead midway through the set on Emma Krivolenko’s serve before the Wildcats figured things out on the fly, righted the ship and came away with the win.
Lee (7-3) travels to Agawam on Thursday.