MURFREESBORO – The South Greene volleyball team’s 17th consecutive trip to the state tournament came to an end on Thursday afternoon in a 3-0 loss to Chattanooga School for the arts Sciences, 25-19, 25-13, 25-19.
“I’m disappointed for the girls. I had seven seniors here that didn’t want to lose their last high school game,” South Greene coach Stephen Gregg said. “I felt like we could have beat this team if we could have gotten past that first set, but we let it get away. The momentum bug got us today and we couldn’t get past some of those mental mistakes.”
The Lady Rebels’ journey to the Class A State Tournament was a bumpy one, but Gregg was proud of his team for how it grew late in the year to make a run to Murfreesboro. South Greene did not even have a winning record until the final weeks of the regular season. But they put things together at the right time to make a postseason run that included a District 1-A and Region 1-A championship.
“It wasn’t anything magical, these girls just had to be willing to accept that we were not going to get here without changing some things,” Gregg said. “The mindset had to change. It was a fun run. We look at the regular season as a study guide for the exam. These girls took some good tests in the district tournament and region tournament to get to this point.”
South Greene finishes with a 19-15 record and as one of the six best teams in Class A.
In the first set on Thursday South Greene played from in front most of the way. That started with back-to-back kills from Emma Padgett to make it 5-4.
The Lady Rebels’ biggest lead came at 9-5 when Emma Bailey made tough dig on the back line that set up Kortnei Bailey for a kill from the left side.
The Lady Patriots swung in front at 11-10 on a block by Amanda Gardner, but Kortnei Bailey immediately answered with another kill.
An ace by Keasley Hankins put South Greene in front 14-13 and then Padgett landed a kill that made it 16-13. Haylee Bird put down a left-side kill that made it 18-15, but then things began to turn.
A push by Gardner tied things at 19-19 as CSAS scored the final nine points of the set. Four of the Lady Patriots’ final six points were scored on South Greene errors in the 25-19 win.
“I felt like we had the first set won, and we let off the gas pedal,” Gregg said. “That took the air out of our sails, and we never got going again. It’s hard to come back from that in a game that depends so much on momentum. We let one mistake compounded into the next and it started to snowball.”
In the second set the teams traded points to a 5-5 tie, but CSAS got going with a powerful slam from Savannah Moore. After a kill and a block by Gardner and a right-side kill from Naomi Williams CSAS was up 11-6.
A second-hit kill from Brynne Burkhart stretched that lead to 19-9. Moore put down three more kills in the closing stretch on the way to a 25-13 win.
In the third set South Greene found the early advantage at 6-3 after Padgett scored on two kills and a tip.
CSAS was able to take advantage of some South Greene errors before Julia Anderson landed an ace that tied things at 7-7.
South Greene’s Whitney Reaves served up an ace for the Lady Rebels to even the score at 11-11, but Moore followed with a back row kill and CSAS regained the lead.
The final tie came at 17-17 when Bailey Ricker sent over a serve that resulted in a Lady Patriots’ error.
In the closing stretch South Greene could not answer CSAS’s attack as Gardner, Moore, Williams, and Alyssa Devaughn all landed kills on the way to a 25-19 win.
