By TIM NOVOTNY/for OSAAtoday
NORTH BEND — Valley Catholic returned to the South Coast for the OSAA/OnPoint Community Credit Union 3A Volleyball State Championships and capped the trip with its third title in four years.
The championship was a repeat, however, in name only. This time the Valiants were facing league foe, and No. 2 seed, Westside Christian instead of Burns. They were also playing at North Bend High School instead of Marshfield High School.
And when they finished off the Eagles 22-25, 25-20, 25-23, 25-22, in a match that lived up to all of the hype and expectation going in, they did so with a team that bore very little resemblance to the 2024 title winners.
“We lost seven seniors, and five of them were key players, to graduation,” said Valley Catholic head coach Becky Kemper. “My junior, who would have been a senior this year, ended up changing schools and she had been co-player of our league. So, when we came in this year, we had a hard time convincing the girls – ‘you, could win a state championship.’ They felt we were such a different team.”
Going into the title game they at least did not have to worry about fear of the unknown. The Valiants and Eagles had met three times since the start of September, with Westside Christian winning the first round before Valley Catholic swept the next two.
The teams and their fans travelled many a mile for round four and they were ready to let their energy out, both on the court and in the stands, once the match got going.
Both teams entered the contest off straight-set victories in the semifinals. Valley Catholic got by Dayton 25-16, 25-22, 25-14, while Westside handled Cascade Christian 25-10, 25-15, 25-20.
From the start, this one had the feel of something special. With the North Bend gymnasium rocking, the teams traded points back and forth. An ace by lone unanimous all-tournament first-team selection Maeve Albert gave the Valiants a 6-5 lead, but moments later a kill from Kyler Hildenbrand knotted things at 9.
Several points, throughout the match, were spectacles. With multiple players laying out to keep the play alive and blockers taking hammering blows from powerful kill attempts, only to see sensational digs keep the ball alive again and send the ball back their way.
The Eagles built a slim first set lead of 18-15. But moments later one such spectacle ended after several shots were dug out by the Valiants’ Gabi Chhay and ended with a kill from Hadley Entizne. That trimmed the lead to one. After the next point tied things at 18 Eagles’ head coach Kristina Thom called a timeout.
She sought out senior Kinley Deewall. Deewall, who had suffered a serious ankle injury midway through the season, had only recently rejoined the squad for the tournament and her coach had a special request of her.
“I told her ‘It is time for you to play angry,’ and that is when you saw her go off and she did. She accepted the challenge,” Thom said. “She is such a steady, yet dynamic player. Kind of like a velvet hammer.”
Coming out of that timeout, Deewall led an Eagles charge with three kills as they pulled away to an opening set 25-22 win.
The Moda Health Player of the game for Westside Christian started off the second set with a kill, as well, and added three more to get Westside back within one midway through the set.
With Brooklyn Postma and Kate Postma also adding to the kill tally, the Eagles were pushing Valley Catholic into the ropes.
But twice in that important second set Chhay made huge diving saves that not only took points from Westside but, on the same play, led to points for Valley Catholic. One play included a dramatic dive out of bounds and into press row. That effort helped the Valiants build their lead to 22-17 and force another Eagles timeout.
Kemper said the defense had to come up big early on for her squad.
“If our block wasn’t doing so well, if our block wasn’t getting hands on balls, we needed our defense to make plays,” she said.
An Albert kill closed out the second set with a 25-20 Valley Catholic win to even the match at one set apiece.
As entertaining and competitive as the first two sets were, the third set may have been the best. Each team, no doubt recognizing the importance of gaining the advantage in the best -of-five.
Valley Catholic jumped out first with another big dig from Chhay leading to a dunk shot from Albert, and moments later an Albert kill to end a long back and forth had the Valiants up 5-2.
The Eagles had no quit in them, however, and fought back to knot things up at eight.
“They do have hearts of champions. They didn’t play scared, they were aggressive and they stayed together. Everybody bought in as a team,” Westside Christian’s coach noted after the game. “There’s honor in being part of a game that is just that competitive.”
Another highly competitive point ended with the start of a big moment for a Valley Catholic freshman. Emma Sarantakos had a huge match, with the biggest stretch coming at this important moment in the vital third set. Scoring on a hit at the end of an epic point, she soon added back-to-back kills to stretch a Valiant lead to 13-8.
“You wonder, how is a freshman going to handle this pressure situation and she handled it excellent,” Kemper said. “She’s had a great season and I’m so excited that I’m going to get her for three more years.”
But thanks to some more kills from the indomitable Deewall, the game wasn’t over yet. And a Louise Steyn ace trimmed the Valley Catholic lead late to 22-20.
But a block by Albert closed out the set 25-23 in favor of the Valiants.
The fourth set looked like it was going to be all Valley Catholic at the start. Back-to-back aces from the Sarantakos helped build an 8-2 lead.
Deewall wasn’t ready to call it quits, though. She tacked on five more kills and got some defensive help sending Valiant spikes back the other way from sophomore Brooklyn Postma as the Eagles stormed back to take a 20-19 lead.
Coach Thom is looking forward to seeing how far Brooklyn Postma can go in an Eagles uniform.
“She peaked at the right time at this tournament. Maybe not enough coaches got to see her play before voting for all-tournament because she certainly, certainly is an all-tournament player. She had huge impact in every match. Unstoppable. I’m so excited to watch her. Big things coming.”
Postma got one final kill in on this season before the Valiants were finally able to shake off their Lewis & Clark League rival, 25-22, and raise the trophy once again.
Thom said it didn’t go they way the Eagles would have liked but she is not walking away with any regrets.
“I don’t feel any regret walking away from that game, the players shouldn’t feel any regret walking away from that. They fought hard. I’m so, so proud of them.”
The two coaches, who share a friendship and much mutual respect, took pride in representing their conference in the final game of the 3A season.
“I knew these are the two best teams in 3A,” Kemper said. “We battled in league and I knew it was going to be a tough match. I told the team; we have to ride the ebbs and flows. They’re going to get runs and points and we’ve got to get runs and points and just hope that that we have longer runs than they do.”
In the end, they had just enough.
THIRD PLACE
Cascade Christian beat Dayton, 25-22, 25-23, 23-25, 13-25, 15-11 as both teams were looking to bounce back from hard fought straight set losses in the semifinals the night before.
Neither, however, showed any seeming malaise about being in the battle for a third-place trophy as they came out scrapping from the start.
The Challengers grabbed the first set behind heavy hitting up front from mighty freshman Morgan Maurer, whose shouts of “yes, yes, yes,” indicated a spike of ferocity was soon to be unleashed.
They also grabbed a tightly contested game 2, a couple of timely aces from Rylan Hunter helping the cause.
But this was not going be another sweep for either team, although, it may have looked that way at one point. The Challengers had built an 18-8 lead and were just seven points away from the sweep, when Dayton got off the ropes and started firing haymakers. Four straight front-line points from sophomore Kalysta Summerlin completed the memorable comeback and gave Dayton a 25-23 win in game three.
Riding that momentum, game four was all Dayton as they rolled to a 25-13 victory and set up the decisive fifth set.
Cascade Christian bounced back off the mat to take the third-place trophy 15-11.
FOURTH PLACE
Burns topped Catlin Gabel, 26-24, 25-14, 22-25, 25-23 in the consolation final. The teams scrapped and fought as though it were the Championship. Four hotly contested sets later, Burns was heading home a little happier.
Paced by sophomore Megan Weil’s 13 kills and three aces and Taylor Trent’s 35 assists, the Hilanders gave the mother/daughter co-head coaches plenty to be proud of from their team.
“They came out ready to go today,” coach Paula Toney said. Her daughter, Courtney echoed that sentiment.
“We were on the attack. We were very aggressive and had that killer instinct throughout the whole entire time and you could just tell that they wanted it more than anything. It was great to end on a win.”
Catlin Gabel had a lot to be proud about, too, when looking back on the season. The sixth-place trophy is the second-best finish in 49 years for the Eagles.
Just to get to that trophy game, both teams needed to win Saturday morning games to stay alive.
Catlin Gabel needed four sets to get past a scrappy Sisters squad, 25-17, 17-25, 25-19, 25-11.
Burns was able to get past Salem Academy in straight sets, 25-23, 25-13, 25-18.
ALL TOURNAMENT
First Team
Hadley Wilcox, Cascade Christian
Jaya McGregor, Valley Catholic
Maeve Albert, Valley Catholic (unanimous)
Hayley Schaaf, Catlin Gabel
Ella Perry, Westside Christian
Gabby Chupp, Dayton
Second Team
Megan Weil, Burns
Kalysta Summerlin, Dayton
Maliha Rajan, Catlin Gabel
Sami Shivakumar, Valley Catholic
Sam Shepherd, Westside Christian
Kinley Deewall, Westside Christian
Sportsmanship Trophy: Dayton
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