Through past winter and fall seasons, the Cazenovia girls volleyball team always carried on intense battles with Marcellus and Skaneateles, looking to rise up to the high standard that those two sides set for so long.
Now, though, the roles have reversed, with the Lakers as the more complete side, as its showed early this week in back-to-back home matches at Buckley Gym.
It started Monday night when Cazenova beat Marcellus in a three-set sweep. An easy 25-15 victory in the opening set up a pivotal second set,
There, the two sides went back and forth, each of them squandering multiple set points before, at 30-30, Cazenovia sneaked in front of the Mustangs and finally earned the set point to win it 32-30.
From there, the third set proved easier, the Lakers taking it 25-18 as Jenna Britton set the tone, augmenting her 25 assists with five aces.
Danielle Tedesco led the front line, putting away 14 kills and adding eight blocks. Willa Mihayli-Koch added seven kills and two aces, with Taylor Eldred and Molly Carges both getting three kills. Carges gained three aces as Katie Davis led the defensive effort with six digs.
Up against another struggling power on Wednesday night, Cazenovia proved the better of the two Laker sides, handling Skaneateles in another three-set sweep.
None of this required anything as taxing as the second set was against Marcellus, though Cazenovia did have to escape a 26-24 opening set before claiming the next two sets by slightly more comfortable margins of 25-21 and 25-20.
Mihayli-Koch had team-high totals in both kills (eight) and digs (12), with Tedesco and Rebeckah Swart each adding six kills and Swart contributing six digs.
Eldred, who had five kills, matched Ashley Marti’s total of nine digs and got three aces as Carges got four kills. Britton anchored the effort, putting up 28 assists and adding five digs, three aces and two kills.
With an 8-3 record and 4-2 league mark, Cazenovia is about to hit a pivot point in its regular season, with a chance to topple first-place Westhill next Tuesday at Buckley Gym, two days before visiting Homer, who sits in third place.
