By Brennan Stebbins (For OzarksSportsZone.com)
Mt. Vernon’s volleyball team continued its hot streak on a big stage Tuesday night in Monett.
The Mountaineers, who came in having won four straight matches without dropping a set, jumped out to a 2-0 lead against top-seed Nevada and then dug deep to pull out a 3-1 win in the Class 3 District 12 championship while avenging an earlier 3-1 loss to the Tigers.
“No game is out of reach and we’ve talked a lot about having belief in ourselves,” Mt. Vernon coach Bridgett Schmutz said. “We can’t outplay our belief so if we believe big then we’re going to play big. I just felt like they really did that tonight. I’m super proud of them.”
Mt. Vernon, seeded second in the district, improved to 20-11-4 with the win and advances to face Mountain Grove on Thursday in the sectional round.
The Mountaineers won a marathon to get there, with two sets requiring more than 25 points to win. They started in a 5-0 hole in the opener, which spurred Schmutz to call an early timeout and encourage her players to trust the game plan.
“We hadn’t executed it yet,” she said. “They took us out of rotation, out of system with their serve. We have a game plan and we just need to trust it and once we get into it I think we’re going to be okay. That happened. Knew it was going to be a battle. I was proud of them for that.”
Mt. Vernon finally tied the first set at 20 and then at 21 before pulling ahead on kills by freshman Ziah Schmutz and sophomore Camryn Cornell. Nevada tied it at 24 and 25, but Schmutz came through with two more kills to give the Mountaineers a 27-25 win.
The second set was just as close until Mt. Vernon went on a 7-1 run to close out a 25-19 win.
Nevada didn’t go down easily, however. The Tigers (23-10) led by as many as eight points with their season on the line in set three and managed to finish off a 25-18 win with a late kill from senior Delaney Hope and a block by junior Jenna Godsey.
That gave Nevada some newfound momentum, and the Tigers carried it over into the fourth set and led 18-11 following an ace by Hope. It was 20-14 after a kill by senior Anna Ashby, and the Tigers looked poised to force a deciding fifth set.
Mt. Vernon had other plans. The Mountaineers scored seven straight points and led 21-20 following an ace by freshman Claire Hale. It was 22-21 after a kill by Cornell, and 24-22 after a kill by Schmutz.
Nevada moved ahead 26-25 on a kill from sophomore Kimber Eaton, but Schmutz scored with a tip and Mt. Vernon led 27-26 after a block. Then Schmutz served up an ace to end it at 28-26.
CLICK HERE FOR PHOTOS OF THE MATCH
“We are a fairly young team with only one senior and Claire Hale comes in and serves for our other middle, for Hali Stokes and Claire is just effective with her serve and I think that was a big momentum swing for us, when she came in and was able to put the ball in play and take them out of system,” Schmutz said. “She’s done that a lot for us this season and as we looked at our game plan and our matchups rotation by rotation, I was like I feel good about having somebody like that. She’s a great defender and did her job serving.”
Schmutz said she felt good about the rematch with Nevada since the Tigers played the first time without senior libero Payge Evans, who missed seven games after getting stitches in her knee.
“We were out of sorts without her,” she said. “She’s our only senior, she’s a great leader, just a voice and a solid rock for us. I felt good that with her back out there we would kind of find our groove and we’ve been playing really good ball. I was excited.”
Now the Mountaineers get another rematch, against Mountain Grove (25-4-2), after falling 2-0 in September during the West Plains Quad.
“Anything can happen, right?” Schmutz said. “We talked about starting last week we were 0-0 … they’re a phenomenal team. The middle they have is an unbelievable player, a lot like Delaney for Nevada. They’re scrappy and really fiery. At this point we’re just going to go out and play our game, play our best ball and focus on doing what we do best and let the chips fall where they may.”
