The 9th graders had a bit of a tough start in their first scrimmage but settled down nicely in set 2 and 3 to use consistent serving and passing with timely hitting to produce a 2-1 comeback by scores of 18-25, 25-15 and 25-14. First real volleyball match for this group and a great start against a solid opponent who pushed the young Hilltoppers.
Junior Varsity used a solid serving game and a very consistent defense to slowly overpower the Raritan squad early on but as the match wore on, the Rockets were able to adjust and force the team into some unforced errors as the kills were hard to come by against their defense. The Top prevailed in set one 25-25-15 but faltered in set 2 late by a 25-20 which forced a decisive third set. Both squads had moments of runs which were matched by the other squad but, late in the the set, Summit looked like they had control at 22-20 forcing a Rocket TO but off the time-out, Raritan took the next 3 points to push the score to 23-22 and forcing Coach Ross into a TO. Summit came off the huddle and proceeded to earn the next 2 points and give themselves a match point. Unfortunately, Raritan took control and managed to fight off the match point and won the next two points to earn the hard-fought victory.
Varsity struggled to find their rhythm in set one despite a 5-1 lead early. The serve receive and hitting efficacy was not where it needed to be early on and it allowed the Rocket Squad to take control of the set in every facet. Raritan out-killed the Hilltoppers 7-5 and out-aced SHS 5-3. Summit won the error battle unfortunately, committing a combined 8 hitting and serving errors while the Rockets were exceptionally solid and committed only 4 errors combined. Final score 25-14 was indicative of the set. The Top did win the pass rating battle by a 1.70 -1.33 but the Rockets just did not commit hitting errors out of system.
Set 2 was a closer affair at 19-25 but the Rockets scored more points holding a 16-10 margin, the exact margin of the set victory as the Hilltop Squad became heavily reliant on Raritan errors to stay in the match and just could not generate any consistent offense.
In set 3, the Hilltoppers began to turn it around as the team out-killed RHS 13-8 and out-scored the Rockets 18-13 but again, the Top got only 7 errors (attacks and faults) from the home squad as Raritan was perfect from the serving line which kept the match close despite Summit having such a large scoring advantage. Meanwhile SHS had their best error free set with only 3 hitting errors and only 3 serving errors to seal the 25-22 win.
Match stats:
Kills - SHS - 26 / RHS - 28
Blocks - SHS - 2 / RHS - 0
Aces - SHS - 9 / RHS - 13
TTL - SHS - 37 / RHS - 41
Hitting Errors - SHS - 13 / RHS - 14
Serve Errors - SHS - 8 / RHS - 2
Faults - SHS - 2 / RHS - 5
FB Errors - SHS - 4 / RHS - 1
TTL - SHS - 27 / RHS - 22
TOP 3 TEAM LEADERS:
Aces: Zacharias 4, Demm 2, Thompson / Feuerstake / Nowicka 1
Serve Rating (min 5 serves): Nowicka 2.40, Feuerstake 2.22, Zacharias 2.15
Kills: Feuerstake 6, Davies 4, Nowicka 4
Kill %: Joseph 40%, Demm 30%, Davies 28.6%,
Kill Efficiency: Demm .300, Joseph .200, Davies .143
Digs: Heary 12, Thompson 11, Zacharias 8
Assists: Zacharias 11, Welsh 9
Top Point Scorers: Feuerstake 7, Nowicka / Zacharias / Demm 5
Net Point Scoring: Demm 4, Nardino 2, Joseph 1
