Giving comeback-minded Farmington Piedra Vista a dose of their own medicine Tuesday night inside the BHS gymnasium, Bayfield blasted into what should be a thrilling Fall 2021 stringing together a 10-2 scoring run to clinch a 25-18, 25-19, 25-15 interstate sweep.
“We were talking that they’d lost a whole bunch of seniors, but we still had to make sure not to underestimate them,” said senior Annie Fusco, almost unstoppable offensively with a team-leading 20 kills at a .485 percentage. “We know there’s some good hitters, and their setter was very good too; we had to make sure to just keep in mind that they could beat us at any point.”
“I feel we definitely picked up the energy at the end,” sophomore libero Myrah Abdallah-Boehm said. “We were kind of slow at the beginning but when we just work together we want to win. It really gets the game going, and the energy for sure.”
Hosting the graduation-ravaged Panthers on ‘Bayfield Blackout’ night, complete with free donated t-shirts for a great number of early-arriving fans, the Wolverines (1-0, 0-0 3A Intermountain) immediately raced out to leads of 10-3 and later 19-9 – via consecutive Emily Nelson kills – before PV inexplicably rallied back to 19-15 via setter Sophia Coleman stuffing down a drifted pass by BHS setter Sage Killough (24 assists).
All too knowledgeable about PV’s volleyball pedigree, Bayfield head coach Terene Foutz called a timeout, disrupting the guests’ momentum, and the home side steadily pulled away to a 1-0 lead in the match when substitute Karyssa Gosney followed up a booming Fusco kill by acing Piedra Vista libero Jaden Sterrett.
Game 2 almost mirrored Game 1, with Bayfield promptly knocking Coleman off the service line and sprinting out to a 9-1 advantage. Panther head coach Hazel Jackson’s subsequent timeout had little effect; back-to-back-to-back Fusco service gems widened the gap to 17-5 and Nelson (6 kills, 9 digs) would max it out at 19-6 with a kill. Another Nelson disposal brought up game point, 24-17, and after PV (0-1, 0-0 NMAA Dist. 2-5A) twice staved it off, BHS went up 2-0 when Killough and junior Kenasea Byrd combined for a scoring block.
“It was kind of defeating,” Abdallah-Boehm — whose eight digs equaled Fusco’s — admitted, of the Lady Wolverines appearing vulnerable during the visitors’ approaches, “but we know we can pick it up quickly ... if we put our mind to it. So we tried our best to change the energy if it was negative on the court; energy changes the whole game dynamic in general.”
“I loved the energy from our student section, our parents,” noted senior Payton Killough, who served three of the Lady Wolverines’ 10 aces. “It helped us…play together.”
“Very loud, very energetic,” Abdallah-Boehm agreed. “I think it’d have been different if there wasn’t as many here.”
Again amongst ‘Others Receiving Votes’ outliers in the week-starting CHSAANow.com Class 3A poll, Bayfield will next battle unranked 5A Loveland and 4A No. 3 Mead in pool play this Saturday’s inaugural Northern Colorado Slam, hosted by 3A No. 1 Eaton.
In addition to those four crews, others confirmed to attend are: 3A No. 9 Kersey Platte Valley, 5A Fort Collins Fossil Ridge, 3A No. 6 Greeley University, 4A No. 1 Monument Palmer Ridge, 5A Brighton, preseason No. 9 Broomfield Holy Family, 4A No. 6 Colorado Springs Discovery Canyon and 4A Longmont.
Each team is guaranteed four matches, and all will be 2-out-of-3 in format with each stanza played to 25 points (any tiebreaking third game will go to 15) using rally scoring with no cap. Following pool play, the teams will be reseeded into one of three title-round brackets for two tell-all tests.
“I’m excited,” said Sage Killough. “I’m excited to see what championship-level teams look like, and to go up there to do work on big, competitive schools.”
“We’re really talking about starting off strong and getting momentum with serve pressure,” Fusco said. “And then just pushing really hard, continuing to hold serve and work hard ... through this whole weekend.”
“We’ve got to serve and pass tough,” said Payton Killough, “and win the first contact so we can set fast, put balls down.”
“It’s going to be a learning experience, being able to play higher teams and get a lot of competition,” Abdallah-Boehm said. “And to better ourselves individually and as a team ... you learn a lot when you have a lot of touches, lots of reps in a day.”
The tournament will be held at Platte Valley’s high school and middle school due to construction at EHS.
