Mount Greylock Sweeps Turners Falls in Western Mass Final
WEST SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – The Mount Greylock volleyball team has won a lot of matches the last few seasons.
On Sunday, it won something totally new: a championship.
“In our volleyball history, we’ve consistently gone to a high level and then we’ve had to deal with a loss, and I feel like this year we’ve worked on pushing through each point and everyone showing up, putting it over, putting it over smartly,” junior Celina Savage said. “From last year to this year, I feel like that’s the mentality that’s changed.
“It’s huge that we can put something up on the banner. To be the first number up on the banner is awesome. It’s an awesome feeling. It’s huge for our volleyball program, and there’s definitely more to come.”
Savage recorded nine kills and four aces Sunday in a three-set win over Turners Falls to give Mount Greylock the Western Massachusetts Class D Championship, the first title in the history of the program.
“We got [state] quarter-finals last year, which actually is going on the banner,” Mount Greylock coach Greg Geyer noted. “But this was the one we’ve been shooting for for years, even before the new format.
“These girls have been working incredibly hard. I’ve been with them for five years. And they deserve to see something for their work like this. They’ve earned it, and I’m proud of them for that.”
Charlotte Coody had 10 kills, Jacqueline Brannan had six, and Julia Dechaine had four kills and three aces in the win. Kylie Sweren matched Savage with a team-high four aces.
The top-seeded Mounties improved to 15-3 this fall and completed a three-game run through the Western Mass bracket without relinquishing a set. Now they wait for Monday afternoon’s release of the Division 5 state tournament bracket; Mount Greylock entered the weekend as the third-seeded team in a division dominated by Western Mass squads.
Sunday’s Western Mass final was a nail-biter throughout despite ultimately ending up a 25-21, 25-19, 25-23 sweep.
The biggest margin for either team all afternoon was seven points, and that happened just once, midway through the second set.
In the first set, Mount Greylock took a 3-2 lead that it never relinquished, but the Thunder (15-3) did not let the Mounties pull away.
The margin did stretch to five on a Talia Kapiloff ace to make it 19-14, but Turners Falls answered with two straight points and later pulled within one at 21-20.
But after a side out, Dechaine served two straight, including an ace, to get to set point, and Brannan finished the set with an offspeed kill at the net.
The Mounties got the biggest lead of the afternoon with a six-point run on Coody’s serve to make it 17-10. The final point of that stretch was a kill by Dechaine, who also started things with a kill for a side out at 11-10.
A balanced attack with at least four kills from four different players was one of the keys for Mount Greylock in the final.
“It’s awesome,” Geyer said. “Especially today. Today, we rotated out of our strong rotation. Celina [Savage] was in the back row. She came out. And Julia [Dechaine] just killed it in that second set. Every time she got the ball, she put it down. It’s a nice thing to have that many weapons.”
A Savage kill on the Mounties’ third set point gave them their biggest margin of the match at 25-19 and gave them a chance to complete the sweep. Geyer said he did not have to say much to keep his players from developing the over-confidence that sometimes creeps in when a team is up 2-0 in the match.
“They’re experienced enough that they hear three words and they can respond to it,” he said. “I like to think that the coaching helps. But in the end, it’s the players on the floor. Toward the end of the match, I just told them what shots were working. In the middle of the third set, I was just trying to get them to stay aggressive. You’ve got to finish your swings. You’ve got to feel confident. And you don’t want to just back off.”
Turners Falls started the third with a 5-0 run to open its biggest lead of the match. The run started with a kill from the hard-hitting multi-sport star Madi Liimatainen.
“We were playing their team, not her,” Mount Greylock libero Lainey Gilll said. “Obviously, we had our eyes on her, and we were trying to capitalize on where she was on the court the whole time. So, yes, we were paying attention to her.”
Geyer said that attention started before Sunday’s match started.
“She’s a phenomenal player,” he said of Liimatainen. “Yesterday, we basically set up our defense to stop her. We changed several things to try to stop her. So she’s a big focus.”
After the Thunder started the third set strong, Mount Greylock got back into it with a three-point run on Sweren’s serve and another three point run on Savage’s to get an 11-7 lead.
But it was 22-20 Turners Falls late.
A Brannan tip got a side out for the Mounties, and Coody served a point to give her team the lead. After another side out, Sweren tip gave Mount Greylock match point at 24-23 and gave the serve to Dechaine. Turners Falls returned the serve, and Coody set up Brannan for a tip from the middle of the net to end the match.
“It’s so exciting,” said Gill, a senior captain. “We have a banner in our gym, and for years it’s been blank. Now we get to put our year on it. It’s really exciting.”