Maine news, sports, weather from Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram, Portland, Maine

September 25, 2012

Volleyball: Tigers overcome Storm's early fury

Scarborough throws a scare into unbeaten Biddeford, which dropped the first set and trailed 7-0 in the second before rallying.

By Mike Lowe mlowe@mainetoday.com
Staff Writer

SCARBOROUGH — The Biddeford High volleyball team may not be perfect, but its record certainly is.

The Tigers remained the only unbeaten team in the state -- in either class -- Monday night, regrouping after a first set loss to beat Scarborough in four sets.

The Red Storm won the first set, 25-22, but Biddeford stormed back, taking the next three 25-22, 25-11 and 25-20 to win the match 3-1 at Alumni Gymnasium.

"One thing we're good at is coming back," said Biddeford's Autumn Dube, a senior middle hitter who sparked the comeback with her play at the net. "We're a clutch team. We're used to being down and bringing it back up."

Dube, who had 15 kills and seven blocks, was at her best in the third set. She scored the Tigers' last three points, blocking a shot at the net and putting down two kills to close it out.

She continued her strong play in the fourth set, pushing the Tigers to an early eight-point lead that they never lost.

The victory lifted Biddeford, top-ranked in Class A, to (8-0). Scarborough, ranked second in Class A, dropped to 6-2, both losses to the Tigers.

"This is definitely a confidence booster," said senior setter Mariah Hebert, who continued her excellent all-around play with four kills, three blocks, three service aces and passes that set up 24 points.

Ruth Shaw, the Tigers coach, was pleased that her team dug deep once again. The match was the Tigers' fourth in 10 days.

"It's been a lot of tough matches," said Shaw. "I think we came in feeling confident, but tired as well."

But she wasn't going to let her team use that as an excuse.

After its first-set victory, Scarborough surged to a 7-1 lead in the second set behind the serving of junior Abby Mills. Shaw called a time-out and let her players know the stakes.

"I said, 'You know what, this team is good and they know it and this is their gym and they want to beat you more than you want to beat them,' " said Shaw. "And the girls responded to that."

"It was all focus," said Hebert. "We needed to focus on what we needed to do."

And once the Tigers got rolling, they were difficult to stop. They tied the set four times before taking the lead for good. Freshman opposite hitter Jocelyn Moody was in the middle of the late rally with three kills.

Then Biddeford took off in the third set. The Tigers went up by seven early and kept pulling away.

"They're just mentally tough," said Scarborough Coach Jon Roberts, of Biddeford. "They weren't going to give up or give us anything. We sort of made a couple of mental errors to let them back in and you can't do that against the best team in the state."

Roberts said he made a couple of coaching errors in the third set -- "Not my best coaching moment," he said -- but that he was proud of the way his players responded in the fourth set. Down 19-11, they got within 21-20 before a net violation swung the momentum back to the Tigers.

"Two, three weeks ago we wouldn't have been able to do that," he said.

The Tigers, meanwhile, continue to look like the team to beat. And they like that status.

"We know we have a target," said Dube. "And they're adding rings every time. But we work hard and we know what we have to do."

Staff Writer Mike Lowe can be contacted at 791-6422 or at: mlowe@pressherald.com

Twitter: MikeLowePPH

 

Tweet