HS Volleyball: Tumwater edges Black Hills in battle for 1st in EVCO 2A

10/11/2022

Tumwater 3, Black Hills 2 (25-15, 25-27, 25-17, 18-25, 16-14)

(Tumwater, WA) It’s always a battle for cross town rivalries but it’s escalated when both teams are undefeated in league play. Both the visiting Wolves of Black Hills and Tumwater came into the match 5-0 in EVCO 2A league play. Both had common opponents with similar outcomes so “on paper” it looked like this one would go to the very extreme end. Many times these “on paper’ match-ups don’t pan out but in this case it certainly did going the full 5 sets plus overtime.

In set 1 the 2 teams battled to an 8-8 tie. That’s when the T-Birds began to pull away with Tumwater’s Bella Burney at the service line she scored 3 including an ace to push the lead to 11-8. After a 1 serve for the Wolves the T-Birds Brooklyn Hayes fired off 3 points and Tumwater surged to a 15-9 lead and never looked back finishing it off 25-15 to take a 1-0 lead.

The Wolves quickly re-grouped and again the two sides met at 8-8 but this time Black Hills did not fade and the two teams would tie at 21-21, 24-24 and 25-25. As they went into extra time the T-Birds were serving but it would be Black Hills’ Ashley Harris who came through with a laser shot down the left side to give the serve and the lead back to the Wolves. Payton Childers then served and on the return Harris popped a hard return just over the tape and the T-Bird defense tried to get under it up but the ball didn’t get up high enough and hit the floor before a T-Bird could get to it and the Wolves tied the match at 1-1.

The T-Birds then used the same pathway they did in set 1 for a 25-17 win. The teams again tied at 8-8 and again this was the point Tumwater began to ease away building leads of 14-11, 17-12 and 24-16. Emily Robello was very productive all match at the service line and scored a key pair pushing the T-Birds lead to 22-15. On that 22nd point Maddie Hurley came up with a powerful kill shot for emphasis and the T-Birds were up 2-1.

The Wolves backs were against the wall and they responded to push this match to it’s rightful 5th set. The early key was a 3-point run at the line for Claire Johnson that gave Black Hills a 10-5 lead. Lily Bauer would score a pair as did Alex Loveless. Childers got 2 big points to go up 21-16 and from there the Wolves maintained and won 25-18 to even the match at 2-2.

In the 5th set the coin flip gave Black Hills 1st serve. A fast start is huge in the 5th set that only goes to 15 but neither team could break free and for the 4th time in 5 sets the 2 teams were even at 8-8. Lily Bauer then scored 2 for Black Hills to go up 10-8 before losing the serve. Tumwater’s Emily Robello made up that ground and more with a 3 point run and a 12-10 lead.

Both teams were using their timeouts to stop these scoring runs and it looked like Tumwater may put it away with Briana Zavala at the line, one of their best servers and a 13-12 lead scored to make it 14-12 and match point. Black Hills denied the T-Birds and got the serve back trailing 14-13 it was still match point when Ava Bauer fired off a big serve and the Wolves rallied for the score to tie it at 14-14. Bauer then fired a low line drive down the far side and the T-Birds could not get to it but the red flag went up indicating the ball was wide and out. Bauer was not in agreement and thought she hit the perfect ace but the point and serve went to Tumwater for match point and Whitney Van Gorkum put it across and the Wolves defense responded but Robello set up Zoe Giuntoli who dropped it between defenders just out of their reach to score the winning point and the T-Birds held on for the 3-2 win.

Tumwater’s Bella Burney earned our Thorbeckes MVP award for her overall performance with several kill shots, solid serving and great backline defense. It was tough to choose as Robello, Hayes, and Hurley all had big nights.

The T-Birds are now 6-0 the at the halfway point of the league schedule and will begin again culminating with their last match at Black Hills on November 3rd. Up next they have WF West on Thursday in Chehalis. Black Hills drops to 5-1 in league play and no doubt have circled that 11/3 date on the calendar. They begin their 2nd half of the season on Thursday hosting Aberdeen.