Published: 11/11/2022 9:46:01 PM
SOUTH DEERFIELD – When No. 1 Frontier leaped out to a 6-0 start in its first set against No. 8 Douglas on Friday night, it set the tone for the rest of the night.
The Redhawks could not be stopped at the service line – they served up 26 aces en route to a three-set victory (25-10, 25-10, 25-12) over Douglas to punch their ticket to the MIAA Division 5 volleyball semifinal. The Redhawks will face No. 5 Paulo Freire, the team they lost last year’s state championship to, on Tuesday at West Springfield High School in the Division 5 semifinal.
“I think that’s been a big part of our success as a team. When we got momentum and we stay hot, we can win big games by such large margins,” Frontier’s Caroline Deane said. “I think that a lot of tonight’s success was due to our serving, we really went for it and I think that’s something we’ve been practicing. So I’m really proud of the girls for having the confidence to go for it.”
Jillian Apanell led the way with eight aces, followed by Sam Baker with six and Deane and Sydney Scanlon with four apiece.
Frontier built up as much as an 11-point lead at multiple points during the first set, keeping Douglas at arm’s reach and taking an easy victory. The second set, though it finished with the same score, was more competitive. Douglas’ middle blocker Ava Lemire was a tall presence at the top of the net, snagging a couple of block kills to stop Frontier’s momentum in its tracks. It took a while for Frontier to figure out a counter attack to get around her blocks.
“As the game progressed, I sort of figured out when she would be there, when she wouldn’t. Huge shoutout to our setter, Sydney, she got (the ball) out to me super fast so she really didn’t really have a lot of time to get there,” Deane said. “As much as she was a good blocker, we got to trick her sometimes, which got me wide open.”
But despite the occasional block that got in the Redhawks’ faces, or a hitting error that slowed them, there was nothing the Tigers could do to keep Frontier at bay. Besides the teams dominance at the service line, Deane and Eve Dougan both picked up nine kills, and Apanell (4), Kate Demaio (3) and Gabby Adams (3) provided scoring depth for the home team. Scanlon tossed up 18 assists and Deane and Dougan led the defensive effort with nine and eight digs apiece.
Douglas pulled out all the stops in the third set, trying desperately to claw a set back in an attempt to prolong its season. It traded points with Frontier early, trailing by three points twice with 5-2 and 6-3 scores. The closest it got after that was a brief 3-0 run that pulled it back to an 11-7 score. After that, Frontier shut the door, outscoring them 14-5 in the remainder of the game to pull out the match win.
“We can’t be perfect the whole game and some things are gonna happen. Shoutout to the subs that got to go in,” Apanell said. “It just shows how deep our bench is and how much trust and how much work everyone puts in.”
Frontier’s bench was called on often during all three sets; once the Redhawks established a commanding lead, head coach Sean MacDonald rotated in a number of his reserve players to close out each set. Getting to take the court in a state quarterfinal match provided invaluable experience, and the bench players still gave Douglas fits on the floor.
“We’ve got a lot of depth today and you really don’t see a drop off. Right now with the tournament roster we’ve had 16 girls all season long, because we’ve got seven seniors leaving and we wanted to start working with some people,” MacDonald said. “We have a lot of kids that work really hard in practice and if they were on another team, they’d be playing full time, they’d never come off the floor. So I try to get them in.”