Article Photos

Advertisement

MAYFIELD - As the Mayfield volleyball team walked off the court after last year's regional loss to Section X champion Chateaugay, thoughts of returning for a rematch this fall started to form.

That remains part of the ultimate goal. Get to states, go through Chateaugay to do it.

The Lady Panthers are a few wins away from getting that chance. At 16-1 overall after a 14-0 romp through the Western Athletic Conference, they are the No. 1 seed in the Section II Class D tournament, which starts Tuesday.

"Just being able to feel all the emotions and being able to go that far last year, I know it motivated me to want to play hard [this year]," Mayfield's Kacie Edwards said.

Edwards is one of three captains on the team, along with Cassi Brancato and Dianna Hime.

The captains said last year's experience helped them this year, but the foundation for their success was put down even earlier.

"The team we have now, when we were on J.V., we were undefeated and won the Pine Bush tournament," Hime said. "We were all expecting to be good because we were good in our J.V. year."

Playing together for as long as they have has built a relationship between the Lady Panthers that has helped them avoid all the drama that can fracture a squad, Hime said.

Instead of succumbing to infighting, they focus on winning, Edwards said.

"I think we've had the higher goal in mind," she said. "We've seen where our potential is and now we want to reach it and go beyond it."

Starting the season with visions of regionals, or even sectionals, can have negative side effects, though.

Before the season started, Mayfield coach Eileen Rovito said she was concerned her team may be overconfident. She said she knew the Lady Panthers had the potential for a great season, but they had to stay in the moment and take each match as it came if they were going to reach that potential.

"All season long, we were preaching to keep working on that, because once adversity hits in the game of volleyball, everything changes - your playing, your consistency," Rovito said. "Once you really have to play and step up, it's a totally different game. All season long, I was confident if we played basic, just with what we have, I knew we'd find success because we have a great bunch. They've worked to be where they are this year and we even talked about it last year, how they clicked as a J.V. group. We knew they'd have something special if they kept their heads together and kept working."

Hime said she thinks the team's enthusiasm and the support they show each other on the court may sometimes come across as overconfidence. Brancato said she thinks the girls have just the right amount of confidence.

"I didn't think we were getting, really, that confident," she said. "We had confidence enough to win and fight for our wins. I don't think we were overconfident."

If their record is any indication, their confidence is well-placed.

Not only did the Lady Panthers win their first 16 matches before falling in five games to Section II Class B third-seed Johnstown in the regular-season finale last Tuesday, they did it relatively unchallenged.

Section II Class C top seed Loudonville Christian pushed the Lady Panthers to five games, but Mayfield won that early-season non-leaguer. The rest of the season, only one team won a game against them.

Saratoga Catholic won the first game of the match in Saratoga Springs, in a gym the captains said can psych out opposing teams. The Lady Panthers recovered for a 3-1 win. They have won 50 games in their 17 matches this season and lost six (three to Johnstown, two to Loudonville Christian).

Along the way, Edwards has accumulated 144 kills and 19 blocks, 45 aces and 105 service points. Brancato has 89 kills, 27 blocks, 185 assists, 44 aces and 100 service points. Hime has 31 kills, 31 aces and 103 service points.

Christie Showers has 117 kills, 35 blocks, 37 aces and 85 service points. Kelsey Henry has 178 assists, 26 aces and 81 service points. Whitney Ostrander has 72 kills and 28 blocks. Edwards, Showers and Kate Costello have been the leaders on defense.

Still, Edwards said she doesn't let the Lady Panthers' success go to her head because the competition they will face in the coming weeks is stronger than most they've seen this season.

The loss to Johnstown in five games just a couple days before the sectional seeds were announced was a blessing in disguise, they said.

"It puts it in our heads that we can lose," Hime said. "We're not a team that can sleep through everyone. It's good to lose before sectionals so we know we've got to put our all into it if we're going to come out a winner."

"They're not just going to hand us the win," Brancato said.

Also, it showed them they're never out of a match, as they recovered from a two-game deficit to forced the fifth game.

That adversity, which Rovito spoke of as a game-changer, put the Lady Panthers to the test just before the postseason and Rovito said she was proud of how they handled it.

"I think we handled the adversity well, compared to other teams I've had," she said. "There's times in the past we'd fall apart. These girls had their little moments, but we talked about it. When you have adversity and things get tense, people get quiet and don't talk as much, they don't communicate as well. We had a little bit of that going on, but it wasn't widespread and it didn't destroy our team. We were still able to play good volleyball through the whole match, so I was very pleased."

She said the core of the team has so much to do with their success and the leadership extends past the three captains to include Showers at middle hitter.

They all lead by example, she said, and Hime is the smiley one who can "get everybody having fun as a team, reminding them we like the sport and that's why we're playing it." Edwards and Brancato, she said, put in extra time with the younger players at the lower levels of the program, too.

But the core girls are only the best of it and the players surrounding them aren't too shabby.

It is a normal sight, after Mayfield wins the first game (with regularity). Rovito starts to rotate her reserves into the match and the level of play is generally stable.

With that strategy, a Game 2 loss or two might be expected sometime during the season, but not in Mayfield this fall.

"You always feel confident when you're going out that they're going to try their hardest to get the job done," Hime said. "Nobody's going to slack off. They all know we're in it together and everybody puts in what they need to put in to get the job done."

"It's good because we're strong as a whole," Edwards said. "I've been on teams where there's one person who's the showboat and everyone else is just there to try to get it to them. It's such a greater feeling when you all do it together and rely on each other."

Starting with No. 8 Waterford-Halfmoon in Tuesday's quarterfinal round, teams will have a dozen Lady Panthers to prepare for - not just a handful of girls.

If Mayfield's girls have their way, No. 2 Lake George will be waiting for them in the sectional finals. They said the Warriors play at the same level they strive for. A win would hopefully send them on to play Chateaugay and prove to themselves they are worthy of a berth to the state tourney in Glens Falls with a regional win.

"Our dream is to get by that regional," Rovito said. "That's as far as Mayfield volleyball has gone. We've been there twice. To do that, that would be the ultimate success of our very successful season."