NTL VOLLEYBALL: CONSISTENCY, TEAMWORK KEY IN ATHENS SWEEP OF TROY (September 1, 2026)
By TIM TAYLOR
Valley Sports Report
ATHENS — Athens seemed to be firing on all cylinders while Troy struggled to find a groove as the Wildcats swept the Trojans,3-0, here Tuesday evening.
Troy hung with the home team in the first two sets before Athens gradually pulled away for 25-16 and 25-15 victories. The Wildcats were able to put their guests in a hole early in the final set en route to a 25-13 win.
The key for the Wildcats was consistency and teamwork.
“We've definitely been working on a lot of that, like a lot of the free ball transitioning and just movements on the court to make sure that we're never letting the ball drop. And oh, my God, tonight the girls really wanted to make a point that they weren't going to let any ball drop on the court, without three touches anyway,” said Athens coach Heather Darrow.
Meanwhile, the Trojans just seemed to be out of sync.
“They definitely were,” said Troy coach Abby Herman-Deitrick. “It didn't feel like we were connecting at all. We kind of had a rough go at it tonight. Athens has some really good hitters, so we just couldn't find any holes tonight.”
The Wildcats scored the first two points in the opening set, but Troy rallied to take a 5-3 lead. Athens didn’t trail for long, coming back to go up for good, 6-5.
The Wildcats extended their advantage to 15-8, but Troy fought back to make it 16-12 behind a 3-point spurt, then Athens countered with a 3-point burst of its own to make it 19-12.
Athens would close out the set by scoring six of the final 10 points.
The second game started as a battle of side outs with six of the first nine points coming via the side out and giving the Trojans a 5-4 edge.
The Wildcats would work their way in front, 12-9, with strong hitting, a couple of Troy miscues and five more side outs between the two teams.
Athens’ Meg Wiles would step to the service line to spearhead a 6-point run to give her team an 18-9 cushion.
Troy responded with a pair of points, but was unable to close the gap down the stretch.
The Wildcats came out hot in the third set as Wiles served the first four points and Ellie Mosher served three more to give Athens a 7-1 advantage.
Athens pushed its lead to 11-3, 13-4, and 15-6, but the Trojans refused to pack it in, chipping away to trim the margin to 17-11 before the Wildcats ended the match on an 8-2 run.
Darrow credited her players’ confidence for the way they played as the match progressed.
“Are we gonna do this? Can we do this? And then, oh yeah, we can do this,” she said. “They put their reps in. They have been really putting the work in, so definitely, the results should be there because of the effort and the reps and the things that they are doing.
“It should be like that out there. It shouldn't just be like, Whoa, what a shocker that we're playing like this, because we work on this all the time in practice. It's really exciting for what we're doing in practice to be showing in the game.
“I am very proud of them because they acted like a team. We weren't dependent on just one kid or anything out there. It was all of them together, and that's definitely what they've been really working on this year.”
“It just seems like we couldn't find anything, any of the sets, that worked really well for us,” said Herman-Deitrick. “We had some girls that were kind of stuck, it seemed like, in a rut where we couldn't do anything right.
“Our defense wasn't where it needed to be tonight, so we definitely have some things that we need to work on.”
Nya Watson dished out 14 assists to go with 3 digs and an ace for the Trojans while Haidyn Watson contributed 11 digs, 5 kills and a block. Bella Wood had 5 kills; Alexa Lawrence chipped in with 8 digs, 3 kills and an ace; Alli Bailey added 13 digs; Liana Lyon had 2 digs and an ace; and Gracie Brown tacked on 1 kill.
Ellie Mosher had 13 kills, 2 aces and 7 digs; Emi McQuay had 4 kills; Evelyn Roy had 9 kills and 4 digs; Hannah Parrish had 2 kills 4 digs and 3 aces; Kendall Gallasso had 3 kills; Lainey Vosburgh had 7 digs; Kayla Forbes had 17 digs and 2 aces; Meg Wiles had 24 assists and 4 aces; and Emma Mallore had 3 kills.
Darrow praised the play of the Wildcats.
“We've got some big hitters, but I'm a team coach altogether, and if we don't have our middles going in holding a block, we don't get our outsides that are going to have a one-on-one block, so it's such a team effort,” she said.
“Ellie is swinging like a monster. I'd never seen her swing that hard before. She was out for blood. Ev Roy, our freshman, I don't even want to call her a freshman. Kayla Forbes and her digging, she did not let a ball drop.
“Meg Wiles was running the court. Hannah Parrish was digging. Laney Vosberg, oh my God, like sometimes I don't see it in practice, and they do it in a game, and I'm like, OK, well, we've got this stuff."
“Emmy McQuay, Kendall Galasso, our middles, they have a lot of work to do, like, going in when they're not even being set and running around, and that is such a hard position. Emma Mallory, that outside hit that she had, it may have been just one giant kill, but my God, that was a huge hit. The ball hit the girl's arms and hit the ceiling, so.
“I thought they just played very consistent and well together as a team. It's just kind of a natural occurrence because they've been playing together for a long time so the travel and all that stuff is just all coming together now.
“Hannah and Emma and Meg as seniors are competitive leaders. They want to win. They aren't just, ‘Yay, we're seniors. They're like, ‘We want to do something.’”
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IN PHOTO 1: Athens’ Meg Wiles. IN TOP PHOTO: Athens’ Ellie Mosher. … PHOTOS BY TIM TAYLOR.
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