Girls volleyball: Inspired Harvest Christian surprises Keith Country Day
BYRON - Harvest Christian banded together to turn a tragic situation into a triumph.
The Lions spent most of Wednesday supporting junior middle hitter Hannah Griffith, as her dad, Scott, suffered a massive heart attack.
Griffith elected to play in Thursday night's Class 2A Byron sectional championship match against No. 1 seed Keith Country Day as a tribute and delivered an inspirational performance.
Griffith delivered a cross-court kill to seal the opening set and thwart a late Keith rally, then reeled off 5 key service points late in set two as the Lions put the finishing touches on a stunning 25-22, 25-18 victory.
A busload of Harvest Christian students along with Griffith's teammates all chanted "Hannah" as they celebrated after the match with the sectional championship plaque in hand.
"Coach said it was optional for me to play, but I wanted to play because I knew we were going to win and I wanted to be a part of that. And I wanted to play for my dad," Griffith said. "I felt so loved for all of them to be around me at the end of this game. It was such a great blessing."
"For Hannah to come out and play today was simply amazing. She had one of her best matches I've ever seen" said Lions coach Mike Bui. "We all rallied and played hard for her and I couldn't be any more proud of the kids. It was all heart tonight."
The Lions (28-10) will face Eureka (32-4) in Saturday's Putnam County supersectional as they attempt to knock off their third No. 1 seed in a row and avenge last year's Class 1A supersectional loss to Eastland.
Harvest Christian, which dropped a 25-22, 25-21 decision to Keith (36-3) two weeks ago, used aggressive serving along with 16 kills and 5 blocks from standout 6-foot-2 senior outside hitter Mikayla Robinson to neutralize the Cougars' powerful attack.
Freshman Zoe Pawelek served a pair of aces and 7 points in the opening set while Amanda Cassidy ran off straight 7 points from the service line in the second set to give the Lions a comfortable 8-1 cushion.
"Keith is the team we wanted from day one, so we spend a lot of time serving in practice and today we came out and ripped serves," Bui said.
"Serving is so important to our team and we want to serve as many as possible, especially when Mikayla is front row. Just feed her as much as we can," Cassidy said.
Harvest led 22-13 in the opening set, but the Cougars rallied to within 24-22 with Robinson stuck on the bench before Griffith stepped up with the clutch kill.
"I was so nervous sitting there, but I knew we could do it," Robinson said.
"We were just trying to get out of that game with one more point and Hannah got that kill," Bui said.
In the second set, the Cougars narrowed the gap to 14-13, but Robinson stemmed the tide by delivering a pair of kills and a free ball win at the net during Griffith's service run. Robinson contributed two more kills and a block to set up Madison Pfister's block on match point.
"I felt so confident at the end," Robinson said.
Junior Zoe Nunez carried Keith Country Day with 15 assists and 9 kills, but the Lions had an answer for everything the Cougars threw at them thanks to their earlier meeting.
"Knowing where they hit and the techniques that they do, knowing how to defend that was important to us today," said Cassidy, who finished with 4 kills and 13 digs.
Sophomore setter Kaitlin Murray collected 23 assists while Candis Kaplan added 11 digs for the Lions.