Sterling volleyball comeback falls short in three sets against Geneseo

STERLING — Thursday night’s Western Big 6 Conference volleyball opener at Musgrove Fieldhouse came down to the wire.

After trailing Geneseo 8-1 in the third set, Sterling did not lie down.

The Golden Warriors battled their way to a 21-20 lead, but the Maple Leafs would close it out, 25-18, 23-25, 25-22.

“It was a great match,” said Sterling coach Dale Dykeman. It was also his birthday. “We knew they were going to be long at the net. They block well, they touch a lot of balls. They’re the biggest team we’ve seen so far, as far as height across the front. It took us a little bit to adjust to that.”

The Maple Leafs (5-3, 1-0 Western Big 6) had a trio of big hitters in Kailee Williams (12 kills, 10 digs), Lizzie Rapps (eight kills) and Elli Barickman (seven kills, two aces), who finished the opening set with a kill. Ava DeSplinter had 15 digs to lead the Leafs.

Dykeman said Geneseo, along with Tuesday’s opponent, Moline, look to be the two toughest teams in the conference.

“You find out who you are real quick,” he said. “As a complete front row, that’s probably the best front row we’ve seen as a unit.

Sterling is 6-2, 0-1. Carley Sullivan led the team with seven kills, Nia Harris and Marley Sechrest each had five. Delali Amankwa led the team with 18 assists and two aces. Macy Anderson also had two aces and 17 digs.

Dykeman said the girls showed a lot of grit to compete until the end after getting down on the scoreboard.

“We talked about putting a lot of pressure on them serving, trying to them them out of system,” he said. “They’ve got a lot of hitters that can get the job done. ... It was nip-tuck there, down to the end we just lost too many of the fifty-fifty balls and had a few too many errors in those lost last eight points that you can’t make against a team of that quality and expect to pull off a win.

“You hate to lose those type of matches but we’re just super proud of the way our girls played.”

Geneseo coach Carlyn McAvoy previously coached the team for 10 years, but is now in her first year back.

She also pointed to grit being a determining factor in the outcome.

“We were making significant hitting errors,” she said. “I thought we didn’t do that the third set, but we were able to kind of rally. I thought we served much better in the third set, and I think we passed much better.”

McAvoy credited Sterling after the win.

“They’re very, very good,” she said. “They’re well-coached. It had to be them making more errors than we did, so it worked out for us tonight.”