It wasn’t always pretty, but the Glastonbury High girls volleyball team remained undefeated with a 3-1 (25-9, 22-25, 25-17, 25-22) victory over previously unbeaten South Windsor High in South Windsor on Friday evening.
Indeed, Glastonbury head coach Tracey Hollenbaugh wasn’t necessarily pleased with her team’s overall performance - she graded the Tomahawks’ play as a ‘C or a C+’ - but she said she would take the victory nonetheless.
“We won that match, but I thought they could have played with a lot more confidence than I thought they did,” Hollenbaugh said. “We should have won it a lot earlier. But we’re still working on a lot of things and we still have a lot of growing to do.”
Still, Hollenbaugh conceded that her team played well enough in hostile territory, as a raucous South Windsor crowd was on hand to watch the CCC North rivals.
“They did show a lot of growth by finishing the match,” Hollenbaugh said. “We passed the first test. … But we’re capable of much more.”
The Tomahawks (6-0) won with a balanced attack - there were five players with at least 6 kills - led by Brenna McHugh, who had 17 kills, while middle hitter Lauren Escribano had 6 kills and 3 blocks and setter Amanda Edison had a career-high 37 assists to go along with 8 service aces.
“That’s the beauty of our team - I don’t have a lot of stars,” Hollenbaugh said. “I really have a lot of girls who love the game and work together well.”
Still, Edison’s setting along with her hard serve proved to be too much for South Windsor.
“When I see [Edison] back there, I take a little bit of a deep breath,” Hollenbaugh said.
South Windsor (6-1), for its part, was led by middle hitter Olivia Boldin (10 kills), middle hitter Megan Macomber (7 kills, 4 blocks) and setter Bryn Galuska (25 assists, 11 digs). Liberos Kileigh Nassau and Aubrey Wood had 12 and 11 digs, respectively.
“The difference today is that we did not keep the ball in play well,” Bobcats head coach Tina Holt said. “In that first game, we just passed the ball all over the place and we could not generate any offense.”
After Glastonbury quickly dispatched South Windsor in the first game, the Bobcats came back to snag the second game - the first game that Glastonbury has conceded in six matches this year - and built a little momentum.
“But it’s hard in high school to bounce back after losing [game one] like that to a good team,” Holt said.
In the pivotal third game, Glastonbury jumped out to an early 11-3 lead and prevented South Windsor from clawing back.
In game four, the Tomahawks again built a sizeable lead - 19-10 - before the Bobcats closed the gap to two points at 24-22 before Glastonbury finished the match.
Holt said that the match highlighted what her team needed to work on going forward.
“I think we’re stronger in the front row with Olivia and Megan,” she said. “What we really need to work on is the passing and the offensive piece now. We are really quick in the defensive play, we made a nice comeback playing defense in game two and we put ourselves in a bad position in game four. We need to clean up our offensive play.”
