Now the Cazenovia girls volleyball team embarks on its longest stretch of uninterrupted practice of the entire season, which is quite welcome.
For a week and a half, the players and coaches will get to work, all in preparation for Friday night’s Section III Class C championship match at Fayetteville-Manlius, a Lakers showdown between no. 2 seed Cazenovia and no. 1 seed Skaneateles.
Just three teams were part of the sectional Class C bracket. Skaneateles had a bye straight into the finals, but Cazenovia had to defeat no. 3 seed Jordan-Elbridge last Tuesday night at Buckley Gym to earn a shot at the title.
A close opening set concerned home fans as the Eagles won it 26-24, but that only seemed to fire up the Lakers, who proceeded to dominate the second set in a 25-14 decision.
That carried over into the third set, with Cazenovia winning it 25-18, and though J-E was better in the fourth set, by a 25-20 margin the Lakers finished off the match.
On the back line, Kylie Fenton’s six aces set a tone for the rest of the team as Maddie Waite produced five aces and led on the defensive side, earning 17 digs. Josie Avery produced 25 assists and added 11 digs.
Helen Hausser dominated on the front line, putting away 16 kills and adding three aces. Lindsey Clements produced seven kills, six assists and seven digs, while Quinlan Emhoff and Carleigh Szalach had five kills apiece. Maren Smith had four kills and two assists.
On J-E’s side, Ashlee Eaton led with six kills, while Sarah Lane picked up 10 assists. Ranait McGuire had nine digs, three aces and three kills as Paige Lane added seven digs. Elizabeth Bartoszewski finished with 16 digs.
Now Cazenovia has a chance to get some payback on Skaneateles, who beat them in four sets on Sept. 12 and then rallied from two different deficits to prevail in five sets on Oct. 8.
Late in the regular season, the Lakers had matches against Hamilton on Oct. 15 and Syracuse Academy of Science on Oct. 17, after which it appeared in the Onondaga High School League tournament at Phoenix,. which was won by Marcellus.
Finally, Cazenovia met up last Thursday against Homer at Buckley Gym, a match where it got to honor its three seniors – Josie Avery, MacKenzie Waite and Julia Bauder.
In the match that followed, the Lakers dropped a close opening set 25-23. After the Trojans won the second set 25-16, Cazenovia nearly prolonged the contest, only to have Homer close it out 26-24 in the third.
Avery finished with 15 assists and eight digs. Emhoff had five kills and six digs, with Waite, Hausser and Fenton getting four kills apiece.
Defensively, Fenton, with 15 digs, and Waite, with 13 digs, led the way as Waite added a pair of aces. Clements had two aces, three digs and two assists. Natalie Tresco finished with three digs.
