‘It’s a great moment.’ Lexington Catholic reaches region volleyball finals for first time.
For the first time in four seasons, the 11th Region high school volleyball championship will be contested between two Lexington teams after 43rd District rivals Paul Laurence Dunbar and Lexington Catholic delivered convincing wins in Tuesday’s semifinals at Madison Central High School.
For No. 15 Lexington Catholic (25-6) it will be the program’s first-ever appearance in a region championship game. For No. 11 Dunbar (27-8), it will be the 13th finals appearance in 22 years. That includes seven region titles and the last two in a row.
The history is not lost on Lexington Catholic senior Addie Lowe.
“We’ve never been here, so it’s a great moment to be in,” Lowe said after the Knights swept No. 17 Great Crossing 3-0 (28-18, 28-16, 25-20) in Tuesday’s late semifinal.
It doesn’t matter that LexCath is 0-2 against Dunbar this year, including a 3-0 loss to the Bulldogs last week in the 43rd District finals.
“I think we just need to stay calm,” Lowe said. “We can’t focus on who’s on the other side of the net. We just need to focus on ourselves and I think we can really come out and make history.”
Lexington Catholic rarely looked troubled against Great Crossing (24-13). The Knights put runs of points together in the middle stages of each set to put a gap on the Warhawks.
After a Shay Pope kill tied the third set 15-15, LexCath libero Maddy Warner began a run of serve that generated five straight points to essentially seal the match.
Warner’s first serve clipped the tape and dropped to the floor in front of Great Crossing’s back line for an ace. That’s when Lowe said she and her teammates knew the match would be theirs.
“I think just staying calm and having confidence really worked for us,” Lowe said. “And having a lot of energy. That really helps us come together and play.”
The win broke Great Crossing’s string of three straight region finals appearances. The 2022 Warhawks were the first Great Crossing team in any sport to capture a region crown.
In its five-set loss to Dunbar on Sept. 17, Lexington Catholic had a match point before losing the fifth set 19-17. That marked a stark contrast to their straight-set loss to Dunbar (25-13, 25-22, 25-17) in the district finals last week. Lexington Catholic coach Jeff Kaufmann believes his team can stick to the game plan this time around and play more like they did in the regular season.
“It’s going to be another tough matchup,” Kaufmann said. “We’re going to try to put the fact that it’s a championship out of the way. I just want my girls to play the best they can out there. That didn’t happen in the district finals. We played much better when we were at their place and took them to five sets. … That’s the type of match we might see here Thursday.”
Dunbar takes down Frederick Douglass
Ranked behind No. 7 Frederick Douglass in the latest coaches’ poll despite beating the Broncos in five sets at The Farm earlier this season, No. 11 Paul Laurence Dunbar wasted little time establishing itself as the team to beat in Tuesday’s first semifinals match at Madison Central.
Dunbar jumped to quick leads of 6-2 in the first set and 6-1 in both the second and fourth sets on the way to a 3-1 win (27-25, 25-20, 17-25, 25-12) to put itself in the region title game for the third season in a row.
Dunbar’s blocking ability helped the Bulldogs string together points in each of the sets they won.
“It’s just such a huge part of our defense,” junior middle hitter Sadie Stuart said. “I’ve been pushing (coach Jenni Morgan) for me to work on it personally and I think that it just really paid off for everybody — passers and blockers working together.”
During the regular season, Dunbar often started slow and had to grind out wins over a number of 11th Region rivals. The pace has picked up in the postseason. The Bulldogs have lost only one set in four playoff matches. They are attempting to win three region titles in a row for the first time in program history.
“Compared to the beginning of the season and now, we just came together and played for each other,” Stuart said. “We talked before the game and we were like ‘we need to have high momentum, high energy and just work well together.’ I think it’s really paying off.
Douglass (24-14) dominated the third set to avoid a sweep, taking it to Dunbar and tooling through the Bulldogs’ blocks. But Douglass could not sustain the momentum after falling behind quickly in the fourth set.
“(Dunbar) played really good defense. They kept the ball alive, and we just got frustrated,” said Douglass coach Nick Griffin, who this week was named KVCA 11th Region coach of the year. “We finally got the momentum back in the third set and just went back to making mistakes. I didn’t want to go out that way, but I’m proud of how the girls fought.”
11th Region Volleyball Tournament
THURSDAY’S FINALS
At Madison Central
7 p.m.: Paul Laurence Dunbar vs. Lexington Catholic.
This story was originally published October 30, 2024 at 7:56 AM.
