Spartans' run ends in semifinals
BIRMINGHAM – The book on the 2018 Mountain Brook volleyball season was closed on Wednesday, one step shy of the ultimate goal.
Mountain Brook High School saw its season end Wednesday evening at the Birmingham CrossPlex in a three-set loss to McGill-Toolen (16-25, 18-25, 14-25). The loss came after the Spartans’ win over Enterprise (25-8, 25-14, 25-9) in the quarterfinals earlier in the day.
“The first match we played pretty well,” Mountain Brook head coach Vickie Nichols said. “We were playing together and things were clicking. That last match, we just never could get clicking. We couldn’t get it together.”
Mountain Brook (46-11) dropped three of its four matches against McGill-Toolen this season, but the most recent meeting between the schools prior to Wednesday resulted in a Spartans win in the Margaret Blalock Tournament final. McGill-Toolen moves on to play Bob Jones in the 7A final on Thursday morning.
“(McGill) played really well tonight, but for us to win against a team that good, all six of ours have to be on, and we weren’t,” Nichols said.
Against the Dirty Dozen, Grace Carr led the way with 12 kills and 9 digs, while Ellie Dayhuff registered 6 kills. Ann Vandevelde racked up 25 assists and 17 digs. Liz Vandevelde finished with 11 digs.
In a dominant win over Enterprise earlier that morning, Mountain Brook started strong and never relented. The Spartans won 11 of the first 13 points in the match and won seven of the last eight to cruise through the opening set. They started strong again in the second, jumping ahead 7-1 and controlling play throughout the final two sets as well.
In the match, Ann Vandevelde notched 43 assists and 14 digs. Carr led the offense with 19 kills and also tallied 12 digs and 5 aces. Dayhuff had 12 kills and 3 blocks, while Evelyn King had 19 digs. Liz Vandevelde finished with 12 digs.
For a team without any seniors, expectations weren’t as high as normal for a program that won three straight 7A championships from 2014-16. There were peaks and valleys through the course of the season, but the Spartans managed to win 46 matches on the season, win the Blalock Tournament, and win the Area 6 regular season and tournament titles.
“It’s been a growing experience,” Nichols said. “We’ve been growing and learning all season. We’re just really proud of what they’ve done. We’ve accomplished a lot more than we probably thought we would in the beginning.”
That dynamic will quickly change once those seven juniors turn into seniors. And Nichols is ready to see how the sequel unfolds.
“Story’s not over. We’ll be back,” she said.
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