In the early portion of the season, it was fairly clear that the Westhill girls volleyball team was ahead of Cazenovia, as indicated by a four-set victory on Sept. 20. But the Lakers avenged that defeat in October, and it the third and most important encounter, Cazenovia prevailed again, in four sets, over the Warriors in Thursday night’s Section III Class C final at Jamesville-DeWitt High School. The tentative uncertainty Cazenovia showed against Westhill in September was long gone. Now, in the opening set of the final, Cazenovia controlled matters with a series of strong plays at the net, plus good serves and defensive play, which led to a comfortable 25-15 victory. Even when the Warriors moved in front during the second set, the Lakers rallied to tie it, 16-16, and then take the lead again, never letting Westhill recover in a 25-20 deicsion. To its credit, the Warriors didn’t make things easy. Playing with urgency in the third set, Westhill breezed to a 25-17 win, and were ready to catch up unless the Lakers responded. During the fourth set, Cazenovia’s response was emphatic. After going in front, every time Westhill got close, the Lakers had an answer, and it continued until match point was secure, a 25-22 win was in the books and a sectional banner was earned. Westhill saw Delaney Martin (14 kills, 20 digs) and Melissa Newcomb (11 kills, 11 digs) lead the front line as Mackenzie Martin fed them with 27 assists and 11 digs. Claire Diefendorf and Xiomara Rodriguez each earned 13 digs as Jordan Tucker contributed 12 digs. Jenna Britton led Cazenovia with 28 assists and 20 digs to go with three aces. On the front line, Danielle Tedesco proved a major force, earning 12 kills and six digs. Willa Mihayli-Koch, with 11 kills and 20 digs, was close behind, while Molly Carges provided nine kills and three blocks. This followed the Warriors’ semifinal win over Skaneateles, who got that far by sweeping Jordan-Elbridge 25-6, 25-8, 25-19 in the opening round. Emily Klock had seven kills for the Eagles and Jessie Karagosian added four assists, with Rachel Gleason (six digs) and Nicole Martino (five digs) leading the defensive effort. In the semifinal, Westhill rolled to a 25-16 win in the first set against Skaneateles, claimed a 25-20 victory in the second set and then closed out the match 25-13 in the third set. Mackenzie Martin averaged more than 10 assists per set, getting 32 in all, and added 10 digs. Many of her passes went to Newcomb, who produced 16 kills and nine digs, while Delaney Martin and Rodriguez produced seven kills apiece Claire Diefendorf contributing four digs. Meanwhile, West Genesee would get one more chance to topple the reigning dynasty in Baldwinsville, as the no. 4 seed Wildcats and top-seeded, defending state champion Bees squared off Thursday night in the Section III Class AA semifinals. Each of the first two sets proved fairly competitive, but WG could not string together the point streaks it needed, and lost by equal 25-19 margins. Then B’ville really took over in the third set, prevailing 25-12 to advance to the finals against no. 2 seed Liverpool, who beat Cicero-North Syracuse in the other semifinal. No WG player had more than the four kills put up by Rachel Hillery and Kayla Case. Kara Sweeney got held to seven assists and two aces, while Brianna Demauro had 11 digs. B’ville’s Meghann Smith had 16 assists, feeding it to Shayna Webber (10 kills), Abby May (six kills) and Rachel Aiello (five kills) on the front line. This followed last Tuesday’s opening-round match, a four-set win over Fayetteville-Manlius.
Having split two regular-season matches with the Hornets, the Wildcats won the first set 25-23 and took the second set 25-16. F-M tried to rally, winning the third set 25-22, and was two points from forcing the match to the limit before WG rose up and claimed the fourth set 26-24 to end it. Sweeney had a big night, mixing in 27 digs, five kills, nine digs and two aces. Often, her passes went to Grace Osterdale, who had 14 kills, with Hillery (six kills), Case (five kills) and Hannah Bakowski (four kills, two blocks) helping out. Case also produced a team-best 18 digs, with Sierra Smith adding 17 digs and Demauro 12 digs. Bakowski and Talore Desantis had five digs apiece. For F-M, Delaney Fuller had 15 kills and Lily Palmer added 10 kills as Markayla Madill earned 33 assists. Meanwhile, in Class D girls volleyball, Bishop Ludden fell in the opening round of the sectional playoffs to LaFayette 25-10, 25-11, 25-18. The Gaelic Knights’ season ended despite five kills from Rachel Martens and six assists from Jessica Villi. Shannon Kelly added three assists.