Photo Courtesy of Jon Mohwinkle.
The 4-seed Grundy Center volleyball team overcame early adversity down 2-0 to rally for a reverse sweep 3-2 over 5-seed Beckman Catholic in a Class 2A state quarterfinal on Tuesday, as aired on 99 The Wave. The set scores were, 20-25, 10-25, 25-23, 25-23 and 15-13.
With Beckman Catholic leading the match 2-0, Grundy Center was on the brink of elimination trailing 22-13 in the third set. The Spartans answered the pressure with a momentum swinging 12-1 scoring run to shock the Trailblazers by forcing a fourth set. In the fourth set, there were 14 ties including a tie at 22. The Spartans managed the high intensity moment with a 3-1 run to push the match to a decisive fifth set. In the fifth set, following a tie at 8, the Spartans maintained at least a one point lead for the remainder of the set to complete the rally and advance.
Head Coach Lori Willis highlights the resilience of the team.
“That’s one thing that we’ve been known for all year long, we had just some insane resiliency. We had some grit. I guess we kind of lulled them asleep a little bit. Then we started fighting, crawling and getting after it. They just never say die. That’s truly what you do because this is a game of volleyball. It’s all about the momentum. Once we got it, we had that reverse sweep. Wow, that was fun,” says Willis. “We knew it was going to be super competitive. If you looked at us on paper, we have the exact same number of kills, everything was similar. We just needed to play with a little bit more grit and a little bit more heart.”
Ryanne Brubaker paced the Spartan hitters with 22 kills. Brubaker shares what helped fuel the team during the rally.
“Tonight we just really worked on what we needed to work on. Falling behind those two and a half sets, it was a big thing for us because we’re at the state tournament and we don’t want to lose,” says Brubaker. “We’ve been dreaming of this since probably elementary to middle school. It’s just really a big thing. We watched the seniors do it before us and we’ve seen how they play. We kind of pulled it out a little bit trying to play like them.”
Jenna Blythe provided an additional spark offensively with 17 kills.
Grundy Center (36-9) will face 1-seed Denver in a Class 2A state tournament semifinal on Wednesday on 99 The Wave. First serve is scheduled for 4:00 p.m. inside Xtream Arena. The winner will advance to face either #2 seed Dike-New Hartford or #3 seed Hinton in 2A championship match on Thursday.
Full Interview with Head Coach Lori Willis:
