Lovejoy denies Fulshear in bid for repeat
GARLAND — Minutes after falling to Lucas Lovejoy in Saturday’s Class 5A state title game, Fulshear volleyball coach Sydney Gotcher joked with players about Monday’s 7:45 a.m. meeting to start prep for next season.
Realistically, the team will get a breather. The Chargers won’t waste much time before speaking a third straight state tournament appearance into existence, though.
For now, a second consecutive state championship isn’t in the cards for last year’s Class 4A state champions. Lovejoy swept the Chargers (25-14, 25-17, 25-22) at the Curtis Culwell Center to win its second consecutive state title and eighth overall.
Lucas Lovejoy’s torrid start was too much to overcome.
The Leopards (26-0) rode a 9-0 run through two kills, five errors and two aces to a 25-14 win. Lovejoy led 13-3 at the end of the run with a service error getting Fulshear back on the board. The Chargers’ next kill came from junior Brielle Warren, but Lovejoy still led 15-5 at that point.
Fulshear found sparks of momentum throughout the match, but overall, Gotcher said her team was not as aggressive as it needed to be defensively, which bled into the offensive’s effectiveness.
“Lovejoy is such a good team,” Gotcher said. “They jumped out quick. We just struggled to find a little bit of a rhythm. We obviously found it a little more in the second set, a little more in the third set. It’s frustrating that it took us that late. Lovejoy is such a great team. That’s obvious. Wewere just unable to find a rhythm and get our chemistry going.”
Perhaps Fulshear’s best runs came in a competitive third set when Ava Underwood’s ace gave Fulshear an 8-7 lead. The Chargers had only led three times during the entire match before that ace — 1-0 and 2-1 in the first set and1-0 in the second set.
Fulshear also rattled off three straight points to cut a deficit to 24-22 at the end of the third set, but Lovejoy wouldn’t relinquish the lead. Grace Milliken’s kill clinched the win.
Warren felt the team started to piece everything together in the first set, but it wasn’t enough often enough.
“Going into the second set, just making the switch and how we were handling our ball and how we were putting things down, I think that also helped add a little bit of a momentum shift,” Warren said. “Like Coach Gotcher said, it just kept getting better, getting better butwe didn’t reach the level that we could’ve reached.”
LSU commitment and senior outside hitter Ellie Echter led the Chargers with 11 kills. Warren, a junior transfer outside hitter, chipped in 10 kills. Junior outside hitter Alexis Dacosta turned in seven kills and 13 digs. Underwood had 27 assists for Fulshear, too.
Lovejoy senior and TCU signee Cecily Bramschreiber, with her second straight title game MVP honor, led Lovejoy with 13 kills. She added nine digs as well.
Lovejoy also denied Fulshear a chance to achieve something else the former already has. Lovejoy won a Class 3A state title in 2011 and followed with another in 4A the next season.
Fulshear (25-5) was dominant on the way to last year’s 4 A title, finishing 45-4 without dropping a set in the postseason. UIL realignment pushed the Chargers up to 5A ,and little changed, with Fulshear winning 5A Region III.
The core of this program responsible for its rise will return for another shot next year.
“It’s a very similar feeling to last year,” Underwood said. “Last year, when we walked away from state after winning, knowing that we were going to 5A, itwas a very exciting feeling because we knew we could compete again. So Ihave the same exact feeling this year. I have no doubt we can get back here again.”