CENTRAL NEW YORK – While a three-set defeat at Baldwinsville on Sept. 5 may have stung a bit, the Westhill girls volleyball team still toyed with its OHSL Liberty division foes whenever it faced them.
This included Skaneateles, who challenged the Warriors last Tuesday night but ended up on the wrong side of a three-set sweep that didn’t take too long.
The 25-8, 25-9, 25-12 romp included 18 Westhill aces, five of them by Ava Baty, who also had a team-best nine kills and gathered 11 assists to nearly match Sophia Johnson’s total of 12 assists as libero Alice Bender had 11 digs.
Again, the Warriors showed good balance on its front line, Baty supported by Eva Tarolli, who earned eight kills, and Grace Horning with her total of seven kills. Bender and Lottie Brudzinski got three aces apiece. In defeat, Skaneteles got seven assists from Delaney Fish and six digs from Quinn Reilly.
A 25-5, 25-10, 25-16 romp of Cazenovia followed on Thursday night, Baty again earning five aces plus four kills, six assists and seven digs. Bender had 20 digs behind a front line where Tarolli amassed 13 kills, Jocelyn Caputo six kills and Emma West five kills.
Needing to bounce back, Skaneateles hosted Marcellus Thursday night and nearly made a spectacular comeback, but it was the Mustangs able to pull out a five-set classic.
Each of the first two sets went to Marcellus by scores of 25-15 and 25-22. Encouraged by the second, Skaneateles controlled the third 25-15 and then did well in the fourth, 25-17, to extend the match to the limit.
After multiple match points, though, the Mustangs won the final set 17-15 as Maddy Foy (16 kills, 12 digs) and Harper Camp (13 kills, 10 digs) led the front line, Dorothy McMahon adding 10 kills to go with seven digs, five blocks and three aces. Lake Ziober had 20 assists and Chloe Kuttruff added 18 assists.
Fish gave Skaneateles 26 assists and nine digs. Celia Rogers got 10 kills and 14 digs, with Hannah Rutsch getting six kills and 13 digs. Reilley had five kills and 13 digs, Madi Rossi adding 16 digs and Finn Pas’cal four kills as Piper McAllister served up three aces.
Two local sides lost five-set matches last Monday – Marcellus to Cazenovia, Solvay to Homer.
The Mustangs’ defeat was particularly painful given that it won the first two sets 25-17 and 25-19, and were close to a sweep before Cazenovia pulled out the third 25-23 and then pulled away, winning the fourth 25-18 and the final set 15-8.
Camp had 13 kills and 23 digs, with Foy getting 11 kills and 18 digs. McMahon amassed 16 digs, six kills and seven blocks as Lake Ziober had four kills and four blocks and Jaidyn Groff five kills. Mary Curtin finished with 19 assists, helped on the back line by Kuttruff’s16 assists and four aces.
As for Solvay, it already had a five-set loss to Cortland Sept. 5 even before taking on Homer, where it lost the opener 25-21 but then pulled out a long second set 28-26 before winning the third 25-17.
Absorbing all this, the Trojans came back, pulled out a 25-21 win in the fourth and dominated the final set 15-6 to negate nine assists from Hannah Cintron and six kills from Ciara Togni, who added 15 digs. Leading the defense for the Bearcats, Rachel Willsey had 24 digs and Gianna D’Eredita added 21 digs.
In Solvay’s 25-20, 25-9, 26-24 defeat to Phoenix, the Bearcats could not quite extend the match despite 16 digs from D’Eredita and six kills from Emma Rutkowski. Cintron got 11 assists and Willsey served up six aces to go with 12 digs.
Playing on Saturday the Bearcats swept Altmar-Parish-Williamstown 25-12, 25-17, 25-13, seeing Riley Gosha earn six aces and six assists to help Cintron (seven assists) on the back line as Togni, Rutkowski and Ashlyn Smorol had four kills apiece.
