By: Joe Blystone
THE VILLAGE REPORTER
publisher@thevillagereporter.com
FAYETTE (August 26, 2024) – Over the years not much bothers veteran Pettisville volleyball coach April Beck. Usually, she’s about as emotion free as someone watching one of those daytime network soap operas before an afternoon nap.
But what put her in a more jovial postgame mood was the fact that her Blackbirds are undefeated at 4-0 after dispatching an improved Fayette team, 25-8, 25-11 and 25-17.
“The season is just beginning,” a smiling, joking, Beck expressed. “4-0 is a great start but we have two more games this week and then we’re off for the fair and we’ll rest and eat fair food and then come back with Stryker which will be a battle, the BBC schools will be a big battle for us, so we are super excited to keep going.”
The Blackbirds swinging bunch up front of Miley Harris, Olivia Miller, Courtney Wiemken and Caroline Sterken each nailed multiple kills in the first set romp.
After leading 3-2 early in the second, Macy Hoylman began a mini surge with an ace to make it 6-2. Kayla Sliwinski’s left side kill and another from freshman Ellie Williams kept the Eagles in contact at 9-5.
It was then that Harris flexed up and delivered five thunder clapping bombs from the left side to pace a 10-0 run to put the Blackbirds in command.
“We moved her from the middle position to the left side,” Beck said. “She has really embraced that, she’s loving it, she is killing it…literally.”
Sterken added an ace and Braylin King’s overpass found the wood during the burst before Kelsie Storrs’ second ball halted the salvo.
Williams’ ace and Sliwinski’s kill got Fayette to double figures, but two Eagle attacks went into the net and Miller’s score form the middle put away the second.
Fayette jumped out to a big 6-1 lead thanks to Kennedy Kunkle’s kill and five Blackbird shots that went out.
Pettisville got back to 8-6 on another Sterken ace but Fayette put together their best series of offense in the match when Kunkle scored from the middle, Williams scored another ace, Sliwinski nailed one from the left and Kunkle finished an Eagle run with an ace for a 12-7 lead.
At that time the Blackbirds took the tranquil and imperturbable manner of their leader and battled back into the set.
Miller scored a two-hand push, Grace Hastings tipped a shot into no-man’s land, then Miller scored on a tip and a laser beam down the left sideline to make it 15-13.
Storrs’ stuffed a Harris scoring attempt, but the Blackbird senior outside began a closing 12-1 run with a pair of left side rips around a third Sterken ace and Wiemken’s kill to take a lead.
“We have worked hard on teaching the girls when you’re down to continue to play through it and work through it,” Beck explained about the Blackbirds calm demeanor and comeback.
“A couple of them wanted a timeout in there and I said ‘no’, ‘fight through it’. I know they can do it and mentally they are growing a little stronger. and that’s encouraging. They didn’t get down on themselves and each other.”
Two Harris’ aces, Hastings’s dump on a second ball and Wiemken’s tip ended the match. Pettisville hosts Edon Tuesday and plays Montpelier Thursday. Fayette travels to North Central Tuesday and Evergreen Thursday.
Pettisville d. Fayette, 25-8, 25-11, 25-17
PETTISVILLE (4-0): Grace Hastings – 11/11 serving, 4 aces, 47/48 setting, 20 assists, 5 digs; Miley Harris – 12/12 serving, 4 aces, 10/11 serve receive, 9 digs, 20/23 hitting, 13 kills; Olivia Miller – 14/17 hitting, 8 kills
FAYETTE (0-3): no statistics
JUNIOR VARSITY: Pettisville, 25-10, 25-11