
Emerie Snuggs gets ready to serve the ball during Scotland’s second round matchup on Thursday night at Scotland High School.
Andrew Smolar | The Laurinburg Exchange
LAURINBURG —The Lady Scots volleyball team advanced to the third round of the NCHSAA state tournament with a 3-0 sweep of No. 10 seeded First Flight on Thursday night at Scotland High School. Scotland improves their overall season record to 21-6 with the victory while the Nighthawks wrap up their season 13-12 with the defeat. Head Coach Adam Romaine was pleased with his team’s performance as a whole, noting that First Flight had some potential mismatches that could’ve been problematic for Scotland but was happy with them simply executing the way they know how to execute.
“They had some size coming in which was my biggest worry and in the playoffs every team is going to be good,” Romaine said. “If we bring that type of team game every night we can play with anybody.”
The first set of the night started out slow for the Scots and was then followed by a lengthy period of dominance. First Flight scored the first five points of the set to put Scotland in a early hole before the Scots responded with 10 unanswered points of their own to force a Nighthawks timeout. That stop did nothing to benefit First Flight as the Scots continued to flex their muscles out of the break, going on a 9-5 run that gave them their largest lead of the set as they were up by nine at 19-10. The Nighthawks never gave up, answering with a 6-0 run of their own that cut the Scots lead down to three and forced a timeout from Romaine. After First Flight managed to trim the gap all the way down to one (20-19), Scotland came through when it mattered most and took the set 25-21.
The second set was a seesaw battle the entire time with neither side truly ever pulling away until the very end. The most points any team trailed by during the first 39 points of the set was three. Scotland started to obtain the late advantage they needed thanks to a 4-0 run that put them up 21-18, resulting in a First Flight timeout. Scotland then stretched their lead up to five at 23-18 and eventually took the set 25-19 to seize firm control of the game up two sets to none. Romaine pointed out the importance of getting control in a tight set like this and wants his team to keep their foot on the gas in these situations moving forward.
“When we get some of those runs we’ve gotten a little bit lackadaisical at times,” Romaine said. “When you have those runs and pull away a little bit you have to keep pushing and can’t let a team come back because weird stuff happens sometimes.”
Scotland never trailed during the final set of the game and had control of it from start to finish. The Scots scored the set’s first two points and then were locked in a 2-2 tie, which would be the high point for First Flight. Scotland then led for the rest of the set rather comfortably, going on a 9-3 run that put them up 11-5. The closest the Nighthawks would get to even after that was a 13-9 deficit as Scotland responded with a dominant 7-1 run that put the set away for good. The Scots would take the final set in impressive fashion 25-15 to complete a convincing sweep.
Addison Johnson had 13 kills to lead Scotland while Jordyn Walker contributed five digs to pace the Scots in that category. Reagan Malpass dished out 47 assists in the victory.
Scotland will now travel to face No. 2 seed West Carteret (who swept No. 15 Western Alamance in three sets to advance to the third round on Thursday night) on Saturday. The winner of the game will host the winner of the No. 19 Person/No. 27 Southern Alamance game in the fourth round on Tuesday, Oct. 29. Romaine gave his team some praise for all they have already accomplished thus far and knows they are capable of continuing to win in the tournament, although he knows it won’t be at all easy, even going as far as to compare the team’s next opponent to SAC powerhouse Pinecrest, who they’ve lost to three times this season.
“I’m proud of the girls for making it this far it’s been a long time since this program has made it to the third round,” Romaine said. “This is a great group of girls to make this accomplishment, and I know they want more. It’s going to be a big fight on Saturday, they have some big hitters and it’s going to take a lot of hard work to pull it off.”