EUCLID — Having knocked off the defending 21-time Euclid district champion two days earlier, Riverside volleyball coach Stacy Sepelak feared a letdown from her girls. But there wasn’t even a hint of one on Thursday, as the Beavers defeated Mayfield 25-21, 25-16, 25-18 to win the Division I district championship.
“I definitely let them know last night that Tuesday (when we beat Mentor in the district semifinals to break the Cardinals’ long streak) was part of history, but tonight completed it, and we’re not done,” she said. “We want to keep going. We definitely didn’t want to have the emotional win and then the letdown. So we talked about it and they knew, and they were definitely ready to play.”
“We got excited after Mentor, and then we just knew we had to focus, went into practice on Wednesday, and came in today ready to play,” Riverside’s Jayne Nagy said.
The top-seeded Beavers (23-3) were strong in all areas, and unlike Tuesday, did not suffer a lull. They earned the right to play in Wednesday’s regional semifinal match at Hudson, against Wadsworth (21-3), which defeated Massillon Jackson to win the Barberton district championship Thursday night.
Theresa Noewer led Riverside with 18 service points, six on aces. In fact, the Beavers gave the second-seeded Wildcats (21-4) fits with the serve all evening, as they served at a 91.9 percent clip (68 of 74) despite doing so aggressively.
“We’re a short team, so serving gives our team offense,” captain Erika West said.
“Serve-receive definitely got us,” Mayfield coach Rosella Glodkowski said.” And if you can’t pass it up, you can’t (run) your offense.”
Setter Nicole Bayer played a stellar match for Riverside with 35 assists and added four service aces. The kills were well-distributed, with Liz Maczuzak (12), West (10), Noewer (5) and Nagy (4) all getting their share.
“(Bayer) does a nice job of mixing it up and getting the ball to different hitters,” Sepelak said. “That really helps us because the other team has to stay honest.
“We’ve worked hard on making our hitters hit different shots, so that if you take one shot away, we’ll go with the other shot.”
In the first game, a Noewer kill for a sideout, followed by three Noewer points, stretched a 15-14 edge to 19-14, and the Beavers were able to hold the advantage, getting points 23 and 24 on two Bayer service aces and, moments later, the winner on a kill by Meredith Widecan.
Game 2 saw the Wildcats build two early four-point leads, but Riverside went up 14-9 when Noewer ran off eight points. Four West points pushed it to 22-12.
On Tuesday, Mayfield had overcome a two-game deficit to knock off South to advance to the final, but it was not to happen this time.
“We knew we could do it — being 0-2 (and coming back),” Glodkowski said. “But it’s not a fun position to start in, and not this game.”
Mayfield did bounce back, but only temporarily. It held a 15-13 advantage, but another Noewer kill for a sideout, followed by six points by Nagy, gave the Beavers a 20-15 lead.
The Wildcats were able to slice it to 20-18, but Maczuzak gave Noewer the serve back with a kill, and four more points ended it, with two coming on service aces and two on Maczuzak kills, with Maczuzak’s final one ending the match.
“(Maczuzak)’s a very sneaky hitter,” Glodkowski said. “She runs the net, and they’ve got a lot of weapons to go to all around. So they’re a well put-together team. “
“It’s a great win tonight, and everything’s been worth it,” Sepelak said.” And we’re not done; we want to keep going. Hopefully, we can.”
Setter Mikayla Zernic led the Wildcats with seven points.
Goldman is a freelance writer from South Euclid.
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