Philomath High School’s volleyball fell behind by 10 points in the third set Tuesday night, then lived up to the mantra the team set before the match: Don’t let the ball hit the floor.
The Warriors came back to finish off a 25-17, 25-18, 26-24 sweep of visiting Newport for their first Oregon West Conference victory of the season. Senior Marri Best served an ace on match point.
“I honestly did not think it was going to be an ace,” Best said. “And when it was, I just felt so overjoyed that I could do that for my team.”
Philomath improved to 4-13 overall and 1-5 in league play. Newport fell to 4-10 and 1-5.
After winning the first two sets, Philomath found itself down 14-4 in the third. The Warriors chipped away but still trailed 23-20 late. After Newport failed to make a play on a ball that bounced around in the rafters, Best and sophomore Alyssa Stanley each came up with kills to tie the set at 23-23.
Newport junior Nadia Henarie put the Cubs back in front 24-23, but Philomath answered with three straight points. A Newport net violation tied it, and with Best at the service line, the Cubs mishandled a receive that sailed backward to give the Warriors the lead. Best then closed it out with the ace.
“We got down pretty bad in the third set, but we didn’t lose hope at all, like we kind of usually do,” Best said. “It was just really great that we had that continuous mindset.”
Senior hitter Nora Stanley led the offense with 24 kills, and senior setter Cheyenne Adams finished with 30 assists.
“Nora had 24 kills tonight, which was huge,” Philomath coach Whitney Thomas said. “Cheyenne did a really good job of getting everybody the ball, though, and that makes a big difference.”
Alyssa Stanley added eight kills and Best had five. Each had two aces. Junior Luci Alley had two blocks.
Thomas also pointed to the play of sophomore Chloe Pedder.
“I made a couple of switches and threw Chloe in there as a second libero to give her some more looks on defense, and I thought she did a really good job,” Thomas said. “She definitely had a few saves for us that kind of came out of nowhere. She’s so fast and did such a good job reading the ball.”
Newport had beaten Philomath in the teams’ first meeting this season.
“We honestly thought that we should have beat them in the first game that we played them, and it was just so nice to get revenge on them,” Best said.
Nora Stanley said the team focused on the mantra of the ball “never touches the floor on our side.”
“We really hustled, and it was awesome,” she said. “I was just so proud of everyone for the effort we gave this match, for our attitudes, for our hustle. It was just fantastic volleyball, and it finally felt authentic to us.”
Stanley added that she had some extra motivation of her own after a tough day in the classroom.
“Rough school day — calculus is hard,” she said. “But I really like turning negative emotions into hard volleyball hits.”
With the first trip through the league schedule complete, Stanley believes the young Warriors are better equipped for the second round.
“We have a pretty young team, and so seeing varsity volleyball for the first time is pretty intimidating,” she said. “But now that we’ve gone through the cycle of the league once, we’re better prepared for the second round.”
Thomas said the improvement she’s been seeing in practice finally carried over to a match.
“Yesterday (Monday) we worked on offense a ton in practice, and I think tonight was the first time that everybody saw, like, ‘OK, here’s the improvement that I see in practice that just hasn’t been translating to games,'” Thomas said. “But tonight I feel like in every aspect, the improvement was finally showing. … You could see them find success.”
Philomath plays at Taft at 6 p.m. Thursday.
Philomath 3, Newport 0
Tuesday, Oct. 13, at Philomath HS
Teams (Record) 1 2 3 Newport (4-10, 1-5) 17 18 24 Philomath (4-13, 1-5) 25 25 26
