The Cardinal Huskies’ girls’ volleyball team may not have had the best start to the season but have turned things around. The Huskies continued to remain in the thick of things in the Chagrin Valley Conference Valley Division race when they swept conference foe Wickliffe 25-12, 25-15, and 25-14 to celebrate senior night last Thursday evening in Middlefield.
“With everything being new this year, these things take time,” said Coach Michael Chaffee. “On Thursday, we had a lot of kids playing different roles and everybody stepped in and did their job which is great.”
It marks the fifth victory in Cardinal’s (9-7, 4-2) last seven contests and the Huskies remain firmly in the hunt for the league title, sitting in third place behind Berkshire and Kirtland with four league matches remaining. Over the stretch of Cardinal’s hot streak, it has and swept four of its last five opponents.
According to junior outside hitter Ali Puruczky, despite the team’s slow start, all it needed was confidence to turn things around.
“We definitely were not very hopeful in the beginning,” the 5-foot-8 junior acknowledged. “We were hopeful that there would be positive outcomes but we never though it would be this good of a season for us so far.”
After the Huskies’ first stretch of league games, they recorded a 3-1 record before beginning their rematches against the rest of the CVC Valley Division. Having begun league play with a 3-0 sweep against the Blue Devils on Sep. 10, the Huskies repeated history with another dominating performance.
“I know Wickliffe was undermanned a little bit on Thursday night,” noted the first-year coach. “On Thursday, it was a great night for us because it was a chance for us to celebrate our seniors and a chance for us to take that next step.”
In the first set, the Huskies seized control when they raced out to a 5-0 advantage. Cardinal maintained its momentum, fueled by a 10-3 run to win by a 25-12 margin.
Chaffee said that during the Huskies’ slow start to the season, one of the things they learned was how to compete in tightly contested matches where they needed to value every possession. The Huskies applied that same mindset to their match against Wickliffe and after being ahead only 8-6 at the beginning of the second set, used a 13-5 run to pull away and win 25-15.
“That is a nice trademark for us,” he said. “We have a lot of confidence in each other and we hustle. We are scrappy and those are things that are going to carry us all of the way through.”
In the third set, Wickliffe did go not quietly and battled back from a 6-2 deficit to force an 8-8 tie but once again, Cardinal did not panic.
“Whenever we got the ball, we just took it and ran with it,” noted Puruczky. “We got on a good run in the third set. My group is such a tough group. They do not give up and even if we are down in such a big hole, we will make our way out of it.”
With the Huskies leading 13-10, they went on a 10-0 run fueled by the service game of senior outside hitter Lili Toll, who recorded two aces, and cruised to another sweep by winning the final set 25-14.
Chaffee said that in spite of the Huskies’ slow start to the season, they were helped by their first few matches all being non-league contests. That allowed him to experiment with different line-ups before figuring out which ones suited the Huskies best.
In addition to learning the right combinations, Chaffee added that the Huskies’ rebound from a slow start was aided by the return of senior middle hitter Lizzy Luciarello at the halfway point, who is Cardinal’s tallest player.
Having established themselves at the top of the standings during the second time through their league schedule, Puruczky said the Huskies are determined to make sure their final year competing in the CVC Valley Division is a memorable one.
“This is so important to us,” she said. “This is our last time playing a bunch of these teams in as important of a game and we just want to make our lasting impression. We came in small and short and we just want to show them what we are made of.”
Following a road match against CVC Valley Division rival Crestwood on Tuesday evening and a home game against conference rival Berkshire on Thursday night, Cardinal will hit the road and take on Mogadore on Monday evening at 7 p.m.
