The South Greene volleyball team wrapped up a perfect run through District 1-A on Tuesday night with a 3-0 (25-18, 25-17, 25-14) win over West Greene, and they will hope to carry that into next week when the postseason starts.
“I’m very pleased with our effort all the way around. It’s one of our better performances,” South Greene coach Stephen Gregg said. “You have to be happy with beating a good team and getting a conference win 3-0. It’s good to win the conference outright, but we know this is just stage one. We have been tracking some things we can control, and tonight we took better swings, we were under control and had a high hit percentage. We trusted our defense and the back line passed amazing.”
South Greene goes into the postseason as the No.1 seed in the District 1-A Tournament that will be played at South Greene next week. West Greene will be either the two or three seed depending on Thursday’s outcomes and potential tiebreakers, regardless it will play North Greene in the district semifinals.
“I’m not going to build them up too much after a good win, because we have been like Jekyll and Hyde this year. That scares me as a coach, but maybe tonight sends us in the right direction,” Gregg said. “We’ve played a tough schedule, but we do that in hopes that everything comes together for the next stage.”
West Greene took the first lead on Tuesday at 3-1 behind two aces from Aleea Aiken, but that quickly disappeared after missed kills on three consecutive plays.
South Greene took the lead for good on a kill from Emma Padgett. Padgett then went to service line and fired off a pair of aces while Kinley McCaslin came up with a pair of kills from the left side on the way to a 14-7 lead.
A kill by Deborah Julian closed the gap to 15-11 for West Greene, but the Lady Buffaloes never got any closer.
In South Greene’s final six points Padgett pounded four kills to close the 25-18 win strong.
Tuesday’s second set went back and fourth early but South Greene went in front 8-5 after McCaslin scored on a pair of slams and a tip.
The lead moved in West Greene’s favor after a strong stretch from Journey Lamons in the middle of the net. She beat the block with a pair of kills and then scored on a block. Kahlie Edwards followed with a kill from the left side that made it 12-10.
McCaslin gave the lead back to South Greene at 15-14 on a thunderous slam from the left post. Padgett then sent over four consecutive aces to make it 19-14.
“Emma had a lot of aces. She was mixing it up with the float serve,” Gregg said. “She was playing a little cat and mouse with them. Sometimes she would hit a top and the next time she would hit with power. Its moving and I don’t know that I would want to try to take on some of those.”
In the closing stretch McCaslin landed a trio of kills while Haylee Bird pushed one deep and then scored on a tip in the Lady Rebels’ 25-17 win.
In the third set South Greene jumped out to a 10-2 lead with McCaslin and Jillian Freeark both dropping in a pair of aces.
Padgett followed with a pair of kills from the left side and South Greene’s lead stood at 15-6 after Bird stuffed one at the net.
Bird and Padgett followed with kills that made it 19-9.
In the finish Ava Brobeck pushed a ball to the back line and McCaslin slammed two in the 25-14 win.
