HEGINS — Maddie Deibert spent Thursday night looking for holes in the Halifax defense — and finding them.
Deibert posted 11 kills, including several on dinks into the heart of the Wildcat lineup, as Tri-Valley defeated Halifax 25-19, 25-20, 25-9 in a battle of Schuylkill League Division III unbeatens.
“I just keep my options open,” Deibert said. “I look before I hit and make sure I know where to push the ball.”
Deibert posted four kills in each of the first two sets. She added three in the final set, including two during an 11-point service run by Cat Troutman, as Tri-Valley (5-0, 4-0 D-III) completed the sweep.
“Very surprised, honestly,” Tri-Valley head coach Alice Scheib said. “I thought it was going to be a long night.”
Instead, the Dawgs, who field six seniors and two juniors in their starting lineup, pulled away from the Wildcats (5-1, 3-1) in each set.
“We’re really young,” Halifax head coach Jackie Miller
said of a roster that contains six sophomores and freshmen. “This is the toughest test we’ve had.”
One reason was Deibert, who recorded two kills in Tri-Valley’s first five points of the match and then found spaces in the Wildcats’ defense after that.
“We came out with what we had. We came pumped. We didn’t take anything for granted and we gave it to them,” Deibert said.
The victory was the fourth three-set triumph in five matches for the Dawgs under Scheib. The first-time head coach succeeded Heather Drumheller, who had resigned after four straight winning seasons.
But Scheib said this year’s veteran lineup has helped greatly.
“They do coach themselves a lot,” she said about the seniors. “We’ve gone to them a lot to say, ‘Help us.’ But we’ve also had to say, ‘Trust us. We’re the coaches.’ I’m 1 year old (as head coach). I don’t know a whole lot. I’ve played the game. I love the game.”
But Scheib said an advantage has been the presence of long-time assistant coach Bonnie Schwalm.
“Years of experience,” Scheib said of Schwalm. “She’s brilliant in my eyes.”
Tri-Valley led the entire first set, though it took three-point service runs by Alyssa Connell and Kat Sherry during the set to pull the Dawgs out to a 17-9 lead.
Halifax narrowed the gap to 23-19 behind kills by Emily Miller and Jordyn Ashberry, but Tri-Valley closed the set with a kill by Sherry, who then served the final point.
The second set was tied five times, the last 11-11. But the Wildcats’ Brianna Turner served into the net and Tri-Valley used three straight errors to take a 14-11 lead that the Dawgs never lost. Two kills by Emily Miller kept the Wildcats in contention, but Tri-Valley scored the final two points for the 25-20 win.
Tri-Valley then held a 5-3 lead in the third set after a kill by Deibert brought the serve back to the Dawgs.
That put Troutman at the service line. She dealt two aces and Deibert had two kills in the 11-point run punctuated by several Halifax hitting errors.
By the time Halifax regained serve on Troutman’s serve beyond the Halifax defense, Tri-Valley held a 16-3 lead that effectively clinched the sweep.
Troutman finished with 16 service points, including five aces, for the Dawgs. Sherry served 10 points, while setter Reagan Newswanger dealt 21 assists.
“They’re the hardest-serving team that we’ve met up with,” Jackie Miller said.
Emily Miller had seven kills for Halifax. Jordyn Ashberry added three kills, eight assists and five digs. Tori Lupold and Kendall Lehman, who had two kills, each had six digs.
“We’re young. We learn, we come back, and we keep fighting,” Jackie Miller said.
Tri-Valley won the junior varsity match, 2-0.