By: Ross Van De Griek
LAND O'LAKES- The Sunlake Seahawks (5-1) dominated right from the opening serve tonight, in their 3-set win over district rival Mitchell (6-5). Sunlake defeated Mitchell in 3 sets (25-10, 25-21, 25-21) & have now won 4 straight matches & have also not dropped a single set in exactly three weeks.
Sunlake cruised right from the opening serve, as the match started with Sunlake going on a 9-2 run, that included kills by Sunlake's Brette Heymann & Sofia McGuire. Sunlake would also later go on a 8-1 run & led 17-3, that was featured by 3 kills by senior outside hitter Caroline Schoonover. Mitchell however did provide a little rally, making it 17-6 that featured a few kills by sophomore Elizabeth McDonald. However, the opening set was just mostly all Sunlake as they cruised to take the set, 25-10.
The second set was a little more back & forth, as both teams started to trade points with it being tied a few times (5-5, 10-10 & 11-11). Sunlake got a couple of aces in the middle set from Caroline Schoonover & Cydnee Reimann. Mitchell responded by getting a couple of aces of their own by Jolie Babcock & Marysa Connors (Saint Leo commit). Later in the second set, Sunlake took an 18-17 lead & didn't look back from that point. Although, Mitchell made it interesting at 23-21, that forced Sunlake head coach Brian Gonzales to take a timeout. Sunlake would wind up closing the set with a couple unanswered points at 25-21.
The third set started a little sloppy from both teams as they were trading service errors for the first couple points of the set. The Seahawks however did respond from the mistakes, by getting a couple of early aces from Cydnee Reimann & Brette Heymann. Towards the midway point of the set, both teams were tied at 10-10. Sunlake's Caroline Schoonover would provide a couple key kills, that started a momentum swing, as Sunlake took a 15-11 lead. Mitchell however would quickly respond with 4 of the next 5 points, to cut the deficit to 16-15 Seahawks. Host Sunlake, however would not go away as they would push their lead back to 23-21. Sunlake would get the next two points, to hang on for the 25-21 third set win & sweep the match, 3-0.
The win was Sunlake's fourth straight head-to-head win over Mitchell, dating back to the 2018 season, where Sunlake went 2-1 vs their district rival.
Sunlake head coach Brian Gonzales on the win. "It's always good to win, but to do it against your district rival, it feels so much better." "We've got up to 6 games in 2 days this weekend, this is our chance to get ourselves among the best teams in the Tampa Bay area", Gonzales added.
Official Stat Leaders for Mitchell: N/A
Official Stat Leaders for Sunlake: Caroline Schoonover (11 kills, 9 digs, 1 block), Sofia McGuire (5 kills, 3 blocks), Cydnee Reimann (4 kills, 3 aces, 1 block), Caitlin Astell (12 digs, 4 kills)
The road ahead for Mitchell: Home match vs Zephyrhills (9/17)
The road ahead for Sunlake: AHN Invitational (9/13-9/14)
Comments