Maine South comeback ends Patriots' season

After an impressive comeback victory of its own earlier in the night, Stevenson volleyball fell victim to a come-from-behind run by Maine South in Thursday's sectional final.

The fourth-seeded Hawks (31-8) -- who knocked off No. 1 seed New Trier in the night's first contest -- faced match point in the second game against the Patriots (29-10) but came back with two hard hits that Stevenson returned out of play. Maine South then erased a 5-point deficit in the rubber contest on its way to a hard-fought 23-25, 26-24, 25-19 win and a spot in Monday's supersectional at Hersey.

"Obviously, we should have taken care of business in that second game against Maine South, and they did a great job of making us pay for that," Stevenson coach Tim Crow said. "Defensively, Maine South was playing real well, covering well, winning some broken plays. And they were able to make some big plays at the net when they needed them.

"In the third game, we just didn't serve-receive well enough to hang around."

The Hawks held a close lead late in the opening game, which neither team ever lead by more than 3 points. But with the game tied at 23-23, Stevenson's Margaret Salata delivered a block kill in the middle. On the next point, Mary Kate Fritzsche hit back off a Maine South block, and the Hawks could barely keep the ball in play.

But facing a similar situation in a similarly close Game 2, Maine South made the big plays late. Down 24-23, it took the lead when Stevenson blocked wide on consecutive hits at the net, then delivered a game-winning drive that the Patriots dug low.

"What I was most proud of was the fact we maintained our composure even though we were up against a pretty big deficit," Maine South coach Kelly Markworth said. "Overall, we adjusted our offense to working the perimeter instead of running it from the middle because their middle block -- especially (Salata and Amanda Fleischman) -- did a really good job. So we made that adjustment and it worked well for us."

Maine South used a 6-point service run from Allison Groessl to pull ahead 23-14 in the deciding third game. Stevenson hung in, cutting the deficit to 5 late, but ultimately fell on a net violation during a long volley.

The loss ended a season that Stevenson started 5-5 before jelling as a unit and putting together a long winning streak. Eight seniors -- including starters Hannah Burke, Kelly Hall, Salata and Fleischman -- graduate from a team that hadn't played together much coming into the season but soon formed a successful squad.

"I think our girls overachieved this year," Crow said. "We knew we'd have a nice team, but we played better than was expected from us. Just the opportunity to put ourselves in position to play in the sectional final was a great achievement for this team."