New to 29-6A play this season, 2-0 Harlan continuing to soar
Inexperienced with a few holdovers from last year’s 37-win squad, the Harlan Hawks are learning as they go as they navigate through Class 6A.
And they are diving into it in this pandemic-shortened season by starting District 29-6A play right away.
So far, the Hawks are holding up, as they showed Tuesday with a 29-27, 25-9, 25-16 victory against Stevens in a district match at Northside Sports Gym.
Harlan improved to 2-0 after sweeping Brennan on Saturday in another district match.
“We kind of jumped right in,” Harlan coach Monica Gonzales said. “There are going to be some growing pains, and we’re gonna work through it. … It’s kind of like learn as you go, but you gotta learn quickly.”
The Hawks went 16-0 in winning the District 28-5A title last season. Six returned from that team that advanced to the third round of the 5A playoffs.
“We’re the new ones,” said Harlan senior outside hitter Kiana
Fallaha, one of the returnees. “So, I mean, we have to set ourselves up for success all the way through.”
Tuesday’s first set offered a huge learning opportunity. The Hawks erased two set points with kills by Fallaha each time. Harlan secure it first on its third set point on a hitting error by the Falcons.
“It set our level on how we needed to be the rest of the game,” said Fallaha, who had eight kills. “We need to start strong, always. We got in the mentality that we needed to take care
of the ball early and fast and then we went on from there.”
Stevens (1-1) covered the floor well and kept firing shots, which didn’t allow the Hawks to flow on offense in the first set.
That changed in the second when Harlan took a 13-1 lead. In that span, the Hawks won 10 straight points on Fallaha’s serve. She recorded an ace in that sequence, and the Hawks had some strong net play by from Trinity Iverson, Mackenzie Vernon and Arissa Willis.
“You can see where I pretty much set myself up for my serve and just seeing where ever Coach (Gonzales) places the ball and making sure I keep serving to those spots and keeping it the same every time I serve,” Fallaha said.
Fallaha’s serving knocked the Falcons out of rhythm and the power they displayed in the first
set, particularly by Mia Francis, was quelled.
“We started off with a little confidence and a little run (in the second set), and then we just pushed forward,” Gonzales said. “We’re very big on our first contact and establishing our middles, and I thought we did a good job on that.”
Harlan’s service game keyed its effort in the third set. Fallaha and Leilani Moore had two aces apiece in the third. Moore’s second ace was on match point.
“This told us that we can go this,” Iverson said. “Even in our toughest times, we can still pull through and come out on top. Like no matter what, we had to talk to each other and get in each other’s heads and just pull through, so I’m really proud of us for doing that.”
Francis had 13 kills and seven digs for Stevens. Faith Ricondo had 22 assists.