Girls Volleyball: MSC Sweeps It, Moving on to the Semifinals

MSC welcomed North Kingstown to their gym on Friday night for the Division I quarterfinals, after finishing the regular season with an undefeated 14-0 record. The Mounties survived a tough game one and rallied to decisive victories in games two and three.

MSC jumped out to an early 8-4 lead with consecutive aces from Kelsey Lace, but the Skippers followed with a 7 point run behind serving from Captain Joanna Chatham and some unforced errors from the Mounties, and led 11-8. MSC kept the deficit to three or less for the remainder and tied the game at 16. The Mounties made 13 errors in game one, which prevented them from getting much offensive rhythm, struggles to be expected after a week off.

"Kind of figured that was what was going to happen in the first game. When you look at the numbers, we had 13 errors in the first game and only 17 for the night. With the bye you get a week off and that's what happens. You've just got a little rust," MSC Coach Josh D'Abate said after the game.

The game remained close up until the end and the Mounties leaned on Lace and Kim D'Alessandro to carry them to victory, with help from a couple late errors from North Kingstown. MSC took game one 26-24.

The Mounties were dominant in game two, going on an 12 point run to open up an early 14-2 lead. Danielle Lippacher had seven of her twelve aces in the run, and her teammates provided solid hitting across the front row to propel MSC. Junior Meaghan Walsh had a couple kills and an ace later in the game to lift her squad to a convincing 25-10 game two victory, and a commanding 2-0 lead.

The Mounties jumped on the Skippers early again in game three. Carissa Gould had two aces and was setting beautifully. Gould delivered a gorgeous backset to Lace which she crushed, for the 10-1 MSC lead. MSC cruised to a 25-11 victory from there and have punched their ticket to the semifinals at URI for the fourth straight year. 

"It's nice to get there, but their goal isn't to get to URI. Their goal is to get there and be the team standing at the end on Saturday. I said to them, 'We got there last year and we came up short. Let's change the outcome.'" said D'Abate.

After dropping games in each of their last three matches, records its 10th shutout of the season and will face off against either South Kingstown or Ponaganset, the only team who's taken games from MSC in both meetings this year, on Tuesday at URI. If they advance they will vie for the MSC's first Division I Girls Volleyball Title on Saturday.