James Wood Volleyball Sweeps Judges, 3-0

Posted: September 24, 2014
By KEVIN TRUDGEON
The Winchester Star

WINCHESTER — Midway through the first set Tuesday evening the James Wood and Handley volleyball teams looked well on their way to a back-and-forth slugfest.

Through the first 29 points the Colonels and the Judges had already had four ties, three lead changes and a tip from senior outside hitter Alexis Zygmunt pulled Handley within one at 15-14.

All signs pointed to a set, and a match, that would go down to the wire.

Then James Wood senior outside hitter Katie Houser hammered home a kill before firing off an ace, fellow senior Ashley Hillyard added back-to-back kills and the Colonels never looked back.

James Wood closed out the first set on a 10-3 run and never trailed the rest of the way as it swept Handley 25-17, 25-15, 25-10 in a Northwestern District match at Donald H. Shirley Gymnasium.

“Once we get a couple kills and we start rolling, that’s when we hit our sweet spot and start bringing the heat and playing well,” Hillyard said. “We were serving aggressively and I thought that’s what got us the lead a lot of the times and we just got in a rhythm.”

The Colonels (12-1, 3-0 Northwestern) jumped out to leads of 14-4 and 10-3 in the second and third sets, respectively, and overwhelmed the Judges (6-3, 2-2), who played well defensively but struggled to muster any sort of offensive attack Tuesday.

James Wood had six players combine for 33 kills, while Handley mustered just nine kills in the match, with freshman Maggie Smith accounting for five of those kills and no other Judge finishing with more than one.

“I felt like we kept them out of their system for a good part of the match,” said James Wood coach Jill Couturiaux. “We were trying to find our rhythm in that first set, Handley definitely kept it a little closer than I would have liked. We know they always push us to play our best ball and we like that.”

The Colonels certainly found their stride late in the first set, as Houser (match-high 18 kills) and Hillyard’s four-point run was followed by another Houser kill and a kill off the Judges’ block from sophomore middle blocker Taylor Heishman.

After the two sides exchanged hitting errors, Heishman capitalized on a free ball at the net to give James Wood set point and sophomore setter Megan Hillyard (team-high 15 assists) finished things off with an ace to clinch the first set 25-17.

The momentum carried over to the second set, as Houser opened things up with consecutive kills, sophomore opposite Leilani Burch found a hole in the Handley defense and the Judges hurt themselves with six hitting errors during the Colonels’ 14-4 run.

“I thought defensively we were staying in the game and being scrappy, and our blocking was definitely on for us tonight and were able to do things we were wanting to do at the net, but we just didn’t have any offensive momentum to attack them and get them off their game,” said Handley coach Lindsay Cole. “Our offense fluctuates from game to game, but we need to work on getting our offense and defense working at the same time.”

The Judges clawed their way back into the second set thanks to a double block from sophomore middle hitter Sarah Snow and senior right side Emily Snow and five straight hitting errors by the Colonels, but the defensive effort could only do so much.

James Wood closed out the set on another 10-3 run, this one highlighted by four kills from Houser and a pair of kills from Ashley Hillyard to take a 2-0 lead over Handley, which managed just three kills in the entire set, after totaling four in the first.

The third set was more of the same, as Colonel junior middle blocker Emma Montgomery got in on the action with a kill of a quick set to start a 7-0 run that was capped with back-to-back kills from Montgomery and Houser.

The Judges got as close as 12-7 following a kill from Wise, but James Wood responded with a kill from senior outside hitter Lindsey Painter and went on a 9-1 run to pull away for the win.

For the match the Colonels got 26 digs from senior libero Ally Iden and three aces from senior defensive specialist Savannah Yost.

Handley was led by sophomore setter Molly-Kate Gavello, who finished with a team-high six digs and five assists in the loss.

“I think once we got to the second and third sets we were trying to do too many things at once and we just needed to settle down and play our game,” Gavello said. “I know I needed to read the blockers better on where I was setting the ball and we needed to be smarter about hitting around them.”

Couturiaux said there was a lot of emotion between the two teams because of it being a local rivalry, and she was happy with how her team responded and finished off the sweep.

“In the last set I just reminded the seniors that this was the last time they were going to play [Handley] on our home court, so I just told them to go out and have fun and they did,” Couturiaux said.

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