Brian Hagberg
RUSSELL, Pa. – In a hard-fought battle between cross-county rivals, Sheffield came away with a 3-1 win at Eisenhower Friday.
The Knights and Wolverines went toe-to-toe through all four sets but Sheffield came away with the 25-21, 24-26, 25-16 and 25-18 win.
“There were a lot of good rallies in all four sets,” Sheffield coach Melissa Lemay said. “Eisenhower’s team plays solid defense.”
To illustrate that point, Lemay said, the Wolverines had 179 attack attempts and 37 kills.
“They were digging balls left and right,” she said.
Eisenhower showed its mental toughness coming back to win the second set after dropping the first. Sheffield answered with a win in the third and held off the Knights to close out the match in the fourth.
“We got a little frazzled after the second game loss,” Lemay said. “We need to be able to control our emotions-not allowing ourselves to get too high and definitely not too low. This is such a game of mental toughness, and we had struggles in that area tonight. Two nights in a row, though, they were able to battle back when we were behind.”
Lynzie Grubbs led the attack with 10 kills and four blocks. Kassidy Orinko had nine kills and Emily Leichtenberger added eight kills and five aces. Annabel Sheldon finished with 23 digs and Kadence Steffan dished out 26 assists.
“Maddy Roell, Lily Lauffenberger and Emily Foster all heavily contributed off the bench,” Lemay said. “It was a total team win.”
Eisenhower’s stats were unavailable.
Sheffield won the junior varsity match 25-18, 17-25 and 15-12.
Foster had four kills and two blocks, Orinko added eight digs and seven aces and Steffan had 13 assists.
Sheffield travels to Brookville Monday, while Eisenhower hosts Cochranton Tuesday.
