Warriors, Pirates to play in next round

Fairview advanced to a district semifinal for the first time since 2015, beating seventh-seeded Firelands, 3-1, on Oct. 20 in a Division II sectional final at Holy Name.

The No. 2 Warriors will face Rocky River, the third seed and a 2017 district finalist, on Oct. 24 at Holy Name in the Parma Heights District semifinals.

It was business as usual for Fairview, which used its well-rounded offense to cruise to an early 2-0 lead over its Patriot Athletic Conference foe. But all bets are off come tournament time, and despite being swept by the Warriors in the regular season, Firelands wasn’t going down without a fight.

The Falcons moved away from an earlier approach of tipping and placing the ball to try and pick apart the Fairview defense, and instead started swinging away, frustrating their opponent, and though they were down, 9-5, used a big service run to take a lead and hold on for the thirdset win.

Fairview (20-3) cleaned up its act and dominated the final set, however, and used a 10-point service run midway through to take a huge lead it would never relinquish.

“I don’t think we panicked,” Fairview setter Emma Szoradi said. “We tell ourselves to calm down. We always tell ourselves to play Fairview volleyball.”

Szoradi, a senior setter, ran the court all game and shared the ball between five teammates who recorded one or more kills in the match.

The Warriors particularly had success out of the middle and got a lot of big swings from sophomore Jade Peace, who tied with senior Meghan Sozio for second-most kills in the match at 10 apiece, while Abby Kuyper had a gamehigh 18 kills.

But it was the block, Peace said, that made the difference in the win.

“I think our blocking was the best it’s been all season and honestly that’s what won our game for us,” she said. “We touched pretty much every ball and didn’t let the outsides get the ball over that much and I think that really helps us.”

The Warriors totaled eight blocks including three each from Peace and fellow middle hitter Madelyn Bochenek.

For Firelands, if the season was going to end with a loss, Coach Jordan Kolarik couldn’t have been more pleased at the level of volleyball her team displayed in its final match of the year.

“We had some amazing hustle plays that kept us in sets, kept us in points,” Kolarik said. “I think we ended playing some of the best volleyball we’ve played all season. We know Fairview’s such a good team and Abby (Kuyper) does such an incredible job from the outside, but to take that set and to keep fighting all night, what a way to end.”

Pirates sweep

Rocky River showed

no signs of rust after a week off and dominated Lutheran West in a 3-0 sweep Oct. 20 to advance to the Division II Parma Heights District semifinals for the second straight year.

The third-seeded Pirates were awarded a first-round bye and had to find ways to stay sharp during a full week of practices while most other teams played sectional semifinals. But the team looked sharp as ever in virtually every facet of the game, rolling over Lutheran West by scores of 25-8, 25-8, 25-13.

The scores aren’t indicative of the Longhorns’ talent, however, and Rocky River (16-7) certainly didn’t enter the game expecting such a lopsided result and was more worried about being away from the game for a week.

“That was one of the things we were worried about, just practicing for a week straight, but I think we just took this past week really seriously,” senior Ava Rauser said. “We took some time off midway through the week just to give ourselves a break and refocus and reflect on the teams we’d be seeing. We kept a really stable mindset. We knew anything could happen.

“We just had the mindset that we knew (Lutheran West was) a really scrappy team, they really care about the game a lot, they have nine seniors so we knew to take them really seriously. We came in confident but not cocky.”

Rauser played with all the confidence of a college recruit, and the Harvard commit racked up a game-high 10 kills and four blocks while going on a five-point service run to end the third set and secure the win for Rocky River.

Olivia Young and Rachael Waite added five kills each, Paige Waite chipped in three and setter Marissa Smiley had 21 assists.

Lutheran West, which was coming off a five-set win over No. 11 Cloverleaf, struggled across the board against the Pirates, but its serve receive was particularly exposed and the Longhorns barely managed to get their passes up to attempt to run an offense.

Of the Longhorns’ 21 sideouts, only eight were earned while the rest were off Rocky River errors, and they totaled a mere 10 kills on the day.

Rocky River will face No. 2 Fairview (20-3) on Oct. 24 in the district semifinal, a team that beat the Pirates at home early in the season, but Rauser said the team has markedly improved since then and is looking forward to all its hard work paying off in a repeat trip to the finals.

“I think we’ve been getting better,” Rauser said. “We’ve had little dips along the path but I think it’s been a constant increase. We’ve done a lot of things to our offense, we’re running a different offensive tempo and game plan that’s been working really well for us. I think everyone is working really hard.”