Monday, October 14, 2019

LIONS AND BULLDOGS AND 2 MORE VICTORIES, OH MY!

The JV and Varsity Hilltoppers took on the Lions of Roselle Catholic and the Bulldogs of Dayton to close out the week and came away with two more victories for each level of the program as the JV Squad improved to 15W-3L (2 shy of program record 17 wins!) and the Varsity Squad earned their 8th and 9th victories, tying the most wins by a Varsity Squad since 2011.

JV took care of the Lions 21-25, 25-15, 25-18 getting outstanding performances from Oberhuber from the outside as the sophomore hit for a season high 9 kills to lead the Hilltopper offense.  Parella had a stellar day, finding 6 different players for at least 1 kill as the sophomore setter had a season high 15 assists on the day.  Macarthur and Szabados led the serving barrage with 9 combined aces (5 and 4 respectively).  Noah was the defensive stalwart notching a team and season high 8 digs in the match.

The Bulldogs had a lot of bark but didn´t show much bite as the Hilltoppers were dominant in a 25-13, 25-13 two set sweep of Dayton. Parella hit for 4 aces and Macarthur for 3 as the match was largely decided on the strength of the Summit serve which kept Dayton from running any real effective offense.  Peralta made the most of her hitting opportunities as the sophomore OH hit for 3 kills and added 2 aces to lead the squad with 5 points.  Lawlor was also impactful from the front row, notching 3 kills as well.  Thompson was solid in defense as the sophomore DS tallied 3 digs to lead the team.  An impressive victory for the Hilltoppers who were missing 3 starters at the onset of the match.


VARSITY TAKE SEASON SERIES FROM ROSELLE CATHOLIC AND WIN IN 3 VS. DAYTON

The Maroon and White had tough losses versus the Pioneers and the Farmers, two of the top 7 ranked teams in the county.  It was Summit´s turn to be the hunted in the last 2 matches as the squad finished off the week against the Lions and the Bulldogs, two teams ranked lower than the #10 Hilltoppers.

The outcome was never in real doubt against the Lions early in set 1 as Walsh opened the set up 5-0 with 3 aces around a Yorio tip kill and Summit never looked back.  By the time Stocks served 2 aces in rotation 3, SHS had exploded to a 13-4 lead on its way to a 25-14 set 1 win.

Stocks and Walsh combined for 7 aces (4 and 3 respectively) and team served at an 88% clip with a 2.64 rating, keeping RC out of system most of the set.  Summit did not pass particularly well, rating only a 1.36 with only 1/11 perfect pass but the team only gave up one ace.  However, the lack of great passing would be an issue in set 2.  Maldonado led the team with 3 kills in the set to pace the offense.

Set 2 was a different story.  Summit trailed 6-2 early and continued to trail 9-12 midway through the set and the hitting errors and passing inconsistencies did not allow the offense to get on track and use its superior height advantage.  Down 14-11,  Maldonado and Vostal ripped 2 kills and had another strong hit that led to a free ball error to get SHS knotted up 14-14.  RC re-took the lead at 15-16 but Vostal notched another kill and Yorio had a dump kill in a 5-3 run that had Summit up 19-17, a lead they wouldn´t relinquish.  Hilltoppers finished on a 6-2 run to close out the Lions.

Maldonado led the offensive effort again with a 7 kill performance but, more importantly, committed only 1 error for a .400 efficiency and a team leading 46.7 kill %.  Goudreau and Vostal were very effective out of the middle, going a combined 7 kills (4 and 3 respectively) out of 15 attempts (46.7 kill %) with an efficiency of .266.  Lopez and Stocks anchored a steady defense with 9 digs apiece.


Against Dayton, the Hilltoppers took care of the Bulldogs 25-15 in set 1 as the team relied on 7 aces to thoroughly dominate the Dayton squad and shut down their offense.  The Bulldogs still out-killed Summit 7-5 but the Top out-scored Dayton 13-7 to take the set easily.  Walsh and Guidetti notched 6 aces (3 apiece) out of rotation 1 and 2 to set the tone as SHS opened a 7-2 lead after those 2 rotations and never looked back.

Set 2 however was a bit different as the Maroon and White could not muster any aces due to the play of the Bulldog serve receive.  SHS gave up 5 aces instead,  were out-killed 9-7 and out-scored 16-8 on their way to a 2nd set loss by the score of 25-22.

The deciding set was a tight affair with the Hilltoppers trailing by 11-9 after 6 rotations. Dayton would not allow a run by Walsh and Guidetti after rotation 7 and 8 and the Top saw their deficit expand to 14-11 after a hitting error.  At some point, the Hilltoppers realized that to get the win, points were going to have to be scored and Goudreau started the process with a shot down the line to zone 1.   An ace by Stocks and a tip kill by Maldonado continued the run and the Top had crawled back to within 1 at 14-15.  Tarashuk then stepped up and changed the set for good with a 6-1 run in which she notched 3 aces and saw Maldonado get 2 kills to put SHS in front for good at 20-16.  Another 5-1 run finished off the Bulldogs, this time spearheaded by Brennan who hit for 1 ace and forced free ball passes over that Maldonado put down for 2 more kills.

Maldonado led the team again with 8 kills and a .222 efficiency followed by Goudreau with 5 kills.  Stocks and Tarashuk passed at a 2.44 and 2.30 rating to steady the reception game that led to the win and Stocks tallied 20 digs to lead the defensive effort.  Guenther and Walsh combined for 18 assists in a dynamic offensive effort that saw 6 different players tally a kill.

Varsity Record now stands at 9W-11L.

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