Barn(ett) burner

The host Patriots wanted to lock up the top spot in the conference for themselves.

The visitors wanted to force the Allen County Athletic Conference title to be shared between the two Patriot squads and Woodlan.

The visiting Patriots were knocking on the door in the fourth set and had match point twice in the fifth. In all three scenarios, Mya Kunkler got the ball back to set up Elizabeth Barnett as the heroine.

Barnett scored the final points in the fourth and fifth sets Thursday evening to lift the Jay County High School volleyball team over the Class 3A No. 7 Heritage Patriots 24-26, 25-23, 15-25, 25-23, 18-16 to finish undefeated in the ACAC and outright claim the conference title.

“We were all working as a team and connecting and putting it down when we needed to,” said Barnett, who had seven of her 13 kills in the final two sets. “We were lifting up each other and anytime someone made an error, we made sure to go to that person to make sure they didn’t dwell on it but kept them excited.

“We kept our energy and had lots of ups and downs, but we finally pulled it together.”

If Jay County (16-8, 6-0 ACAC) lost to Heritage (21-6, 4-2 ACAC) there would have been a three-way tie between the two Patriots squads and the Woodlan Warriors for the conference title. The win earned Jay County sole possession of first place, the first ACAC title in a decade and the first under JCHS coach Amy Dillon. It also acted as revenge for Saturday’s ACAC tournament, in which Jay County won the first set before dropping the next two to HHS.

“It feels great,” Dillon said. “I knew we could do it and I’ve told them all season that I think they could beat anybody on our schedule. So it’s just getting them to believe in themselves. …

“We got to see Heritage and we took a set off of them so we knew that we could beat them. … I knew blocking and defense would win us this game.”

Early on in the fourth set, JCHS went on a 6-0 run to go up 8-5, but then gave up an 11-3 run to give Heritage control. Heritage drew closer to victory with a 22-19 advantage, but a block by Kunkler and a ball-handling error by Alexa Walter provided some late life.

Walter made up for the error with a kill to give Heritage a 23-21 advantage.

Cue the duo of Kunkler and Barnett.

Kunkler again made it a one-point set with a tip kill before Barnett rattled off three straight kills, two to the back right corner and one tipped over the block, to take the set and force a fifth.

Kunkler and Barnett again played the heroines in the fifth set. When HHS had match point at 15-14, Kunkler blocked Alana Gutshall, who had a match-high 19 kills.

Heritage pulled ahead again as Hallie Schwieterman’s serve went into the net.

Kunkler then tied it up again at 16-16 with a kill off the block of Audra Bickel.

Barnett then gave Jay County the lead with a flat-footed kill that sailed over the blockers and fell in before the backline. The senior then sealed the match and conference title with a big swing into the block of Kendall Roy and Ava Johnson.

“I was really just trying to go where they weren’t and using the block to get kills,” Barnett said. “I had my setter and she was using me a lot and telling me, ‘Come on, Liz you’ve got this,’ and told me where to go. My back row was telling me where to go as well and you just have to listen to them.”

Through the first three sets, Dillon ran out a lineup that focused on having two bigs — the middle blockers and Schwieterman — on the floor at all times to counter Heritage’s height and versatility.

Jay County gave up four runs of three or more points as it dropped the opening set. In the second, the ACAC champs took advantage of five late errors before finishing the set with a Kunkler kill, a block from Maira Hemmelgarn — one of 10 for JCHS — and one of Schwieterman’s 17 kills.

Jay County felt some fatigue in the third set and it showed with 10 attack errors and two service errors, making up 48% of Heritage’s points in the set.

Despite the ugly set, the Patriots were able to pull out the win. One key to that was switching back to the Patriots’ regular lineup to give them more natural breaks, while also subbing in Ella Rigby to give setter Paisley Fugiett a breather.

“I probably shouldn’t say this as a coach, but after that fourth set I looked at them and was like, ‘I didn’t know that you could do that, and I didn’t think that we could do that,’” Dillon said. “We didn’t come to this fifth set to lose this on our home court. … I know a couple of our players were getting tired again and I think taking the chance to put someone in and give them a break really helped us.”

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Jay County volleyball vs. Heritage (10/2/2025)