LA CENTER — Sure, the La Center volleyball team lost a five-set match in Thursday’s 1A Trico regular-season finale to Castle Rock, a match it had a chance to clinch a share of a league title and earn the No. 1 seed to next week’s 1A district tournament.
But coach Cymany O’Brien was the least-upset person inside the Wildcats’ gym.
How could she be, calling the Wildcats’ 20-25, 25-19, 25-22, 20-25, 8-15 loss the best match her team’s played all season, in a packed home gymnasium, with great volleyball played on both sides of the net?
Disappointed? Hardly.
“If we play like that,” she said, “there’s no doubt in my mind we can punch our ticket to state.”
But the path at repeating its 2016 feat — falling two wins short of a state trophy after winning the 1A district title — won’t be easy. That’s because out of the six teams from the 1A Trico and Evergreen leagues that reach the district tournament Wednesday, only two make the Yakima Valley SunDome for the Class 1A state tournament Nov. 10-11.
Thursday’s match between the Trico’s top two teams also decided the Nos. 1 and 2 seeds. La Center controlled its own destiny, too, but needed a sweep in order to secure the top spot after falling to the Rockets in four sets in the teams’ first meeting Oct. 10.
And a win to clinch a share of the league crown.
But after Castle Rock took the first set using a 12-5 run to pull away for good, the best La Center could hope was sharing the league title by just winning the match.
It looked to be that way after La Center took a 2-1 lead in the match. In the third set, the Rockets’ largest lead was 15-7 before big plays from Laynie Erickson, Emma Shahbazi, Abby Banholzer and Sydney Mairose propelled the Wildcats into another level.
They scored the final four points following Castle Rock’s timeout when La Center trimmed its lead to 22-21, including two aces from Mairose.
“There’s no fear,” said Erickson, who finished with 35 digs, 18 kills and five blocks, all team-bests. “We’re not afraid. We know what we have to do and we’re not afraid to do it.”
It was that set, O’Brien added, that changed the Wildcats’ tune.
“I did not doubt that they wanted it,” she said. “It really got them pumped up — they showed how badly they wanted it.”
Banholzer added 13 kills and Shahbazi had 10. Setter Amanda Holm had 63 assists and Tiffany Chandler, a freshman, had 26 digs.
But small mistakes bit La Center. The Rockets’ momentum from a back-and-forth fourth set, getting their largest lead at 24-20, carried over into the first-to-15 final frame. They used a 6-0 to claim the win and No. 1 seed.
Since the district tournament isn’t double-elimination for La Center’s first match, the Wildcats open districts against Montesano, the third seed from 1A Evergreen League next Wednesday.
But Erickson is confident to see the Rockets again in the district title match Nov. 4.
“We’re confident we’ll have another shot,” she said.
