Jay spikers survive

DECATUR — This time of the season there’s only one goal.

Survive and advance.

By the skin of their teeth, the Patriots will live to play another day.

Jay County High School’s volleyball team held off a Knight rally late in the fifth set to escape with a 25-22, 19-25, 25-19, 23-25, 17-15 victory against the Norwell Knights in the Class 3A Sectional 23 quarterfinal on Thursday at Bellmont.

“I feel like they were the better team,” said JCHS coach Amy Dillon, whose team was coming off a four-match winning streak and a Union County Invitational on Saturday. “I don’t think that we played to our potential tonight.

“I just did not want them to see the season end like that. It was completely up to them.”

The Patriots, who move to 15-14 on the season, advance to the sectional semifinal at approximately 12:30 p.m. Saturday against sixth-ranked Wapahani. The Raiders (25-4), who were Class 2A state runners-up a year ago, defeated the Delta Eagles in four sets earlier Thursday night.

The first semifinal pits fifth-ranked Burris (24-6) against No. 3 Bellmont (25-5). The sectional final is slated for 7 p.m. Saturday.

Jay County, which won all the odd sets, was in command of Norwell (11-20) early in the fifth set with an 11-7 advantage before the Knights took two of the next three points, forcing Dillon to call her first timeout.

Madison Dirksen, who had a match-high 25 kills, tallied one out of the break, and Abbie Fields (18 kills) followed with another to give the Patriots match point.

However, two JCHS errors and a Ariann Blinn kill staved off defeat for the Knights, making it 14-12 and causing Dillon to stop play once again.

Miscommunication and an attack error allowed the Knights to tie the score at 14-all before a Fields kill and a Patriot hit that sailed long tied the score yet again.

But Fields got a kill to give her team the lead. And unlike it had four previous times, Norwell was unable to rebound and had an attack hit the net for match point.

“I don’t know if it was nerves,” Dillon said of why she felt the Patriots weren’t able to put the match away earlier in the set. “When we run that 6-2 (offense) we have to use some of our younger kids to go out there and play, so I think that maybe nerves coming into this game knowing that these upperclassmen are counting on them; these seniors thinking it could be their last game.

“I think … finding that grit to pull through so that it wasn’t our last game was probably what won us that game.”

The Patriots never trailed in the opening set despite having the score tied twice. Dirksen rifled eight kills in the set. Norwell’s Nicole Hiday, who led the Knights with 11 kills, had three in the opener.

Jay County committed five service errors in set two, and appeared as if it was going to cruise to another win with a 12-5 lead early. Norwell, which trailed by seven again, 15-8, went on a 17-4 run the rest of the way to even the match.

The third set worked in the Patriots’ favor as they jumped on top 7-1. A seven-point run later in the set with Grace Brewster at the service line — her three aces were tied with Hannah Muhlenkamp for second behind Fields’ four — gave Jay County the biggest lead of the night, 18-7. Although Norwell scored eight of the next 12 points, the Knights never got closer than five as Jay County took a two-sets-to-one advantage.

Both teams were unable to hold a serve to start the fourth set through the first 10 points until Jordyn Xayyachack got the ball for the Knights. The sophomore served four straight points for an 8-5 Norwell lead. The Knights didn’t trail again in forcing a fifth set.

“Sometimes I just think our defense wasn’t quite ready to play,” Dillon said. “Some of those hits — I think we get in position sometimes when it’s pass-set-spike, and we’re where we’re supposed to be — but tips and everything else, the junk, we have trouble with sometimes.”

Lauren Brewster and Brunswick added to the offense with five kills apiece, and Izzy Rodgers set up her teammates with 48 assists. Sophomore Brenna Haines had 34 digs, with Grace Brewster and Muhlenkamp chipping in 18 and 17 digs, respectively.

Brunswick and Fields shared the team-high of six blocks.

The road only gets more difficult for Jay County, which has lost the sectional semifinal each of the last two years. Wapahani was added to the field this year because of the IHSAA’s tournament success factor.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do (in practice Friday) night,” Dillon said, whose team lost to the Raiders in three sets Sept. 2 in Selma. “I don’t think we played well at all when we went to Wapahani. That was the best team we had played at that point in our season so we were a little thrown off.

“I hope that sitting and watching (the first match Thursday) gave them a little bit of confidence because we did beat Delta and Delta was competing with them. I told them all I really want you to do is come in here Saturday and compete; do your best and walk out of here knowing you did all that you can.”