If you were at the Northern Neck District volleyball championship between Northumberland and Lancaster on Thursday, October 29, and your hands weren’t sweating, your heart racing and you weren’t sitting on the edge of the seat, were you even alive?
In what had to be an historical district championship match, the Lady Devils beat the host Lady Indians, 3-1, with two sets going into extra points. In fact, I’ve been covering high school sports for 37 years and I’ve never seen a closer, more hard fought match on both sides than that one. Both teams left it all on the court.
Neither team led by more than five points in any of the four sets. Lancaster won the opener, 25-23, then gave up set two to the Indians, 21-25, before battling to a 34-32 win in the third. Yes, you read that right. A standard set usually ends at 25, if a team has a two-point advantage. And if it goes into extra points, a team has to win by two.
These two teams traded points the entire night.
The match was decided on another extra point set. Lancaster won the fourth set, 27-25.
Kailyn Allen and Kelsie Cox led the Lancaster hitters with Allen laying down 19 kills and Cox 14. The Lady Devils are missing junior hitter Lexi VerMeer, who sustained an injury about four weeks ago and is out for the remainder of the season.
Lancaster had 51 total kills in the match with Kynleigh Wilson putting over five and Rory Lally and Suzi Geier finishing with four each.
Izzy Gill got above the net for three blocks and Cox had two.
Addie George led an LHS defense that was kept on its toes. She had 26 of the team’s 99 digs. Lally had 19, Kelsey Bishoff had 14, Geier 13 and Allen 11.
Lally led the ball handlers with 28 assists.
Northumberland had 54 kills. Lacie Self led with 23 and Ally Biddlecomb put over 14. Eva Williams had 15 digs and Self 14. Lillian Hayden led in the middle with 46 assists.
The Indians swept Westmoreland, 3-0, in a semifinal to advance to final, while Lancaster took a tougher road, outlasting Rappahannock, 3-2, in a tie-break match on Tuesday, October 27.
Semifinals
Lancaster 3, Rappahannock 2
Lancaster spotted Rappahannock the first two sets, 25-27, 22-25, but rallied to pick up three straight, 25-6, 25-20 and 15-9, in the district semifinal at LHS.
Cox had 13 kills and Allen 12 to lead Lancaster’s attack. Wilson and Bishoff had six kills each.
The Lady Devils got low for 110 digs in the five sets. George led with 32. Lally had 20, Bishoff 18, Geier 15 and Allen 13 as the Raiders worked the back line.
Lally had 18 assists and Allen 13.
Lancaster took a 21-4 record into the Region 1A tournament.
Rematch Thursday, November 5th
The stage has been set for a rematch of last week’s Lancaster versus Northumberland volleyball showdown.
Both the Lady Devils and Lady Indians won their respective Region 1A quarterfinal matches on Monday, November 2, with third-place LHS outlasting sixth-place Rappahannock, 3-1, and second-place NHS sweeping seventh-place King & Queen, 3-0. The two will meet at 6 p.m. tonight, November 5, in a regional semifinal at Northumberland. With a lot on the line, the winner gets an automatic berth into the Class 1 state tournament; the loser’s season comes to an end.
Also, top ranked Middlesex swept eighth-place Northampton, 3-0, and fourth-place Mathews defeated fifth-place West Point, 3-1, in the other quarterfinals. Middlesex and Mathews will play at 6 p.m. tonight in a semifinal game at West Point High School.
The regional championship will be Tuesday, November 10, at the higher seed.
