Sweet Home, North, South girls volleyball advance
by PATRICK J. NAGY Reporter

Amherst's Emily Molzen (19) and Grace Mariani (9) go for a block versus West Seneca East last Friday in a Section VI Class A prequarterfinal game. Amherst lost in three games. Photo by John Normile Purchase color photos at www.BeeNews.com

The seasons of three girls volleyball teams in the Town of Amherst are still alive.

Two-time defending Section VI Class A champion Sweet Home, seeded second, and Williamsville South, seeded thirteenth, advanced to the quarterfinals with victories last Friday over fifteenth seed Hamburg and fourth-seed Hutch-Tech, respectively. Williamsville East, seeded fourteenth, and Amherst, seeded eleventh, were each eliminated.

In Class AA, ninth-seed Williamsville North made the hour trek to eighth-seed Jamestown and won in three games.

Sweet Home

The Lady Panthers' trek for a three-peat in Class A began with a 25-14, 25-12, 25-8 home win over Hamburg.

"We dominated the entire match," said Sweet Home coach Breean Trapasso. "We had a couple of rotations that took control. They had a lot of trouble serve-receiving and we capitalized on that."

Kelsey Maving and Jill Reeser served five aces each. Maving also had eight digs; Reeser added six digs.

"Kelsey served nine or ten points in a row and another time Jill served nine points in a row."

Ellie Allen added eight kills. Deborah Conti had six kills. Carol Skoney chipped in 10 digs.

Sweet Home played tenth-seed Iroquois in the quarterfinals on Tuesday. The result was unavailable before The Bee went to press. Sweet Home won both meetings during the regular season. The winner plays Starpoint or West Seneca East on Thursday.

Williamsville North The Lady Spartans headed into its quarterfinal match at Lancaster on Tuesday unbeaten in its last 12 games.

Since dropping the first game to Jamestown in a four-game home win on Oct. 17, North hasn't lost. They beat Amherst and Williamsville East in non-league games in three games before winning at Jamestown, 25-20, 25-16, 25-22.

"I tell the girls to break down each game into five little games (win up to 5, 10, 15, 20, 25)," said North coach Tom Sproull. "Jamestown only beat us once to five in any of those games."

Sproull said Jamestown is known for being scrappy and not letting balls hit the ground.

"That's what we're doing better," said Sproull. "We're playing the balls we normally don't play. Our feet are moving more and we're rallying for points."

Sproull lauded the play of setter Stephanie Clabeaux, outside hitters Emilee Slick and Jen Pawlak and middle hitter Amanda Holden.

Sproull said the playoff win was huge.

"It was good for the program," said Sproull. "We need to win playoff matches more to play teams like Lancaster and Frontier. The sooner we do, the sooner we can close the difference with those teams."

North is 7-12. The result of the Lancaster game was unavailable before The Bee went to press.

Williamsville South

The Lady Billies beat Hutch-Tech 25-14, 25-18, 25-17. Coach Gina Becker could not be reached before The Bee went to press.

Williamsville East

The Lady Flames found out why Starpoint is one of the better teams in the area. Starpoint defeated East, 25-12, 25-11, 25-18.

"They have everything you want," said East coach Scott Wright. "They're strong at every position and does everything well. They have at least one All-Western New York candidate in my mind, Samantha Palka. She hits on the outside for them and hits the ball at a high percentage."

East finished 3-12.

"We were close in several matches, but couldn't put it all together," said Wright. "I can't put my finger on it. Sometimes we played good volleyball; other times we played mediocre volleyball."

East graduates five seniors, the biggest losses being setters Mary McDaniel and Kelly Rusin and middle hitter Karen Kingsley.

Amherst Central

The Lady Tigers ran into a scrappy West Seneca East team in its Section VI Class A prequarterfinal road game last Friday. Amherst, seeded eleventh, fell to sixth-seed West Seneca East, 20-25, 11-25, 14-25.

"West Seneca East ran down every single ball that came down," said Amherst coach Jen Loretto. "Personally, I felt we could have won at least the first game, but West Seneca East fought back to win. In the second game, we were tied at 2-2 and gave it right back to them with two missed serves."

Amy Simon and Jenny Newhouse each had four kills. Simon and Newhouse are two of six seniors on the roster. The other seniors are Emily Molzen, Casey Martin, Liz Lytle and Katy Tirella.

Amherst finished 6-6 in ECIC Division III and 10-7 overall.

e-mail: pnagy@beenews.com