CENTRAL NEW YORK – Even with a slow start and a mid-season coaching change, the Marcellus girls volleyball team still managed to find itself at Phoenix’s Emerson Dillon Middle School Friday night playing for the Section III Class B championship.
Westhill didn’t care much about the Mustangs’ fairy tale, though, completing its season-long domination of the small-school ranks with a three-set victory to earn its third consecutive sectional title.
Both of their previous meetings on Sept. 17 and Oct. 15 had resulted in sweeps, with Marcellus only breaking the 20-point mark once in six total sets.
And the first two sets of the sectional final followed this pattern. Sharp in every phase of the game, the Warriors rolled to a 25-13 win in the opening set and controlled the second set, too, taking it 25-18.
Determined to at least prolong the match, the Mustangs built up a 20-13 advantage in the third set, and even when Westhill made up the ground, Marcellus twice had set points on its serve.
Fighting them off, the Warriors tied it at 26-26, then took the lead on back-to-back errors and, thanks to a service ace, closed out the set 28-26 and the sectional championship as well.
Two milestones happened along the way. Westhill Libero Alice Bender passed the 1,000 mark in digs with 20 on the night, while Eva Tarolli earned her 500th career kill on her way to 12 kills and four blocks.
Ava Baty and Lottie Bruzdzinski both picked up eight kills, Emma West adding six kills and Jocelyn Caputo four kills. Sophia Johnson recorded 31 assists as Baty earned four aces and seven digs, Bruzdzinski also earning seven digs.
For Marcellus, Harper Camp produced 10 kills and Maddy Foy added eight kills. Jaidyn Groff got four kills as Chloe Kuttruff earned 24 assists. Dorothy McMahon (seven digs) and Maddy Richer (six digs) paced the defense, but Lake Ziober, a force on the front line all season, was held to one kill.
All of this followed semifinals last Wednesday where Marcellus put away no. 3 seed Homer in four sets and Westhill had a lopsided three-set sweep of Cazenovia.
A close first set between the Mustangs and Trojans went 25-22 in favor of the Mustangs, who carried that momentum to a 25-19 second set. Though Homer just avoided the sweep 26-24 in the third, Marcellus won a comfortable 25-19 fourth set to end it.
With her 44 assists, Kuttruff passed to a front line led by 15 kills from Foy and 14 kills from Camp. Not only did Ziober earn 10 kills, she had a season-best seven blocks and four aces next to McMahon’s total of nine kills. Groff earned four kills as Richer’s six digs matched Foy.
Westhill, meanwhile, jumped all over Cazenovia 25-8 in the opening set, with a nearly similar 25-12 win in the second before a 25-16 third set closed out the Lakers.
Tarolli finished with nine kills, while West earned six kills and Baty had five kills. Bruzdzinski had four kills and three blocks as Sophia Johnson dished out 21 assists and Baty set a career mark with eight aces. Bender got nine digs.
With another sectional championship secure, the Warriors will meet the Section VII or X champion next Saturday in the Class B regional final hoping to win and return to Glens Falls for the Nov. 23-24 state final four.
