SAYRE'S RUSSO RECORDS 500TH CAREER DIG
By CHRIS MANNING
Valley Sports Report
ATHENS — Sayre successfully defended its District 4, Class A title here Friday, defeating MMI Prep, 3-1, to claim its second straight crown.
"It feels great," said Sayre coach Colby Sangrey. "Trying to build off last year our goals were to get to where we did last year, and to keep pushing past that and it starts here."
The Redskins rolled to a 25-11 first set win then saw MMI Prep pull away for a 25-16 second set victory.
Sayre took control in the third set for a 25-15 win, then held off a late Preppers charge for a 25-23 win.
"It feels really great that I can do this for my team, and make a statement like this," said Sayre's Reghan McGaughey. "I really hope we can do it again next year, and I'm so proud of our team."
McGaughey finished with 25 digs, eight kills, and eight aces, while libero Grace Russo had 20 digs to eclipse the 500-dig milestone.
"I'm so surprised but it feels great," Russo said. "I've been playing volleyball since seventh grade; I'm just so surprised, but it feels amazing."
Yhale Doon had 30 assists, 13 digs, and an ace, with Alex Schack adding 12 digs, seven kills, and two aces.
Azalea McClenny notched 15 kills, two blocks, one assist, one ace, and a dig, and Emily Strickland had two kills.
Mylee Medina added five digs, with Ember Jones chipping in with one dig.
Last year, Sayre was the upstart underdogs taking down Canton, but this year they had more expectations.
"It's definitely a little shift in mentality," Sangrey said. "We play fantastically as underdogs when we've got nothing to lose - we just lay it on the line. And a lot of the matches we played this year and a lot of the matches we played last year it one us some games. Now, coming into this season, it's hard to have that underdog mentality so you just have to find different ways for motivation - you still have something to prove."
Sayre couldn't have asked for a better start in the first set as McGaughey served up seven straight points for the Lady 'Skins, three of those points being aces.
"It was great," McGaughey said about that start. "It got us in our groove, and really showed us that we can meet this team even if they are from another district."
The Redskins never looked back as they won by 14 points largely behind their serving - they had six aces in the game to go with eight kills.
"Even when they were getting points it was just a side-out nearly immediately," Sangrey said.
MMI Prep found its district legs in the second set as they took a 2-0 lead to start. Sayre came back with two points of their own, then when it was tied 3-3 Schack had back to back kills to put the Redskins up 5-3.
A Doon ace made it 6-3, and three points later it was 8-4 Redskins.
Four points was the biggest lead Sayre had during the set, going up 11-7 on another Schack kill, but MMI Prep would out score them 7-2 over the next nine points to take a 13-12 lead.
Sayre tied things up at 15-all, but a Victoria Park kill from MMI Prep started a five-point rally for the Preppers as they went up 20-15.
An MMI Prep serve that hit out ended that run, but Prep started a new one, this going scoring five straight points to get the 25-16 win.
"The problem was our energy was down a little bit," Russo said about their lackluster second set. "We did the Hokey Pokey, we got our spirits up, and encouraged each other. I think that really helps make a huge difference."
The third set Sayre came out with back to back kills for Schack, and then a McGaughey ace for a 3-0 lead.
They would get up by as much as 9-3 before the Preppers had back-to-back points to make it a 4-point deficit.
Sayre would extend the lead to 13-7 only to watch MMI Prep's Alexa Fazio get two straight kills to rally Prep as they cut it to 13-10.
They wouldn't get it any closer than three points, though, because after it was 15-12 on a Ruhani Shah kill Sayre got a hit from Schack followed by back to back kills from McGaughey to take an 18-12 lead.
From there they out scored 7-3 to go up 2-1.
"We were making our own mistakes," Sangrey said about his team's struggles. "But over there, they were playing phenomenal defense, they were just getting everything up and keeping it alive. That's a great way to play the game, play defense until the other team makes mistakes.
"We gave them a good number of points for not keeping the ball on the court, and it happed a little bit in the third set, but we did clean it up enough to take that one," he added.
The final set saw Sayre take a 3-0 lead and just keeping building, getting up by as much as 17-8.
That's when MMI Prep began to chip away, scoring eight straight points to make it 17-16.
A Schack kill ended that run, then back-to-back kills from McClenny gave Sayre some breathing room at 20-16.
A pair of MMI Prep errors made it a 6-point Redskin lead, and it peaked after a McClenny hit, with Sayre up 23-16.
MMI Prep had one more rally in them as they cut it to 23-20.
A McClenny hit put Sayre on the brink, but three straight MMI Prep points cut it to 24-23.
The set ended on a net serve from the Preppers, giving Sayre the district title.
"I think we played really calmly," McGaughey said. "It was a little nerve-racking because, obviously, we didn't want to lose. We wanted to keep going, and I'm really proud that we persevered, and stayed strong."
Sayre will host the District III third-place team on Tuesday as they look to make another state run.
"It's nice to have that experience," Sangrey said. "It's nice to be able to play at home again.
"The district and community showed up big time last year, they're going to do that for us again to create a fantastic environment," noted Sangrey. But having that experience, and knowing what states is like, and know the teams that come to states, its going to help us for this year. That said we still have a lot of work to put in because teams just get better from here."
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IN PHOTO 1: Sayre's Reghan McGaughey. IN TOP PHOTO: Sayre's Alex Schack. ... PHOTOS BY CHRIS MANNING.
