JEFFREY REINHART jreinhart@LNPnews.com
WARWICK, PENN MANOR, MANHEIM TOWNSHIP, CONESTOGA VALLEY ELIMINATED; MENNONITE, GARDEN SPOT LONE TEAMS TO ADVANCE
Short roadtrip for me Monday night over to Wilson High School (home of the 42-second national anthem) for pool play in the District 3 Double-A boys’ volleyball playoffs. Tough night for the L-L League; just two teams got through pool play and advanced to Wednesday’s quarterfinal round — joining Hempfield, the league champ, which earned a first-round bye. Here’s my story from Tuesday’s New Era:
WEST LAWN — Bye, bye Buckskins.
Conestoga Valley, the reigning Lancaster-Lebanon League runner-up, made a quick exit from the District 3 Double-A boys volleyball tournament Monday night, finishing last out of four teams in Pool A play at Wilson High School.
The Buckskins, who fell to Hempfield in the league title match last Thursday, dropped all three of their matches on the first night of the district playoffs.
CV fell to Hershey, Wyomissing and West York — all by the final score of 2-1.
Wyomissing (3-0) won Pool A and Hershey (2-1) finished second. They’ll advance to Wednesday’s quarterfinals.
CV and West York (1-2) were eliminated.
“It’s disappointing,” CV senior setter Billy Lor said. “We didn’t come out and play our hardest. And we had some passing problems from the start. We had some passing mistakes in the Hershey match, and we couldn’t get good sets. If you can’t get good sets, you’re not going to get good hits.”
It was not a good night for three L-L League Triple-A entrants — Manheim Township, Penn Manor and Warwick — who all lost first-round matches and were eliminated.
However, a pair of Double-A teams — Garden Spot and Lancaster Mennonite — survived pool play and advanced to Wednesday’s quarterfinals.
Manheim Central was eliminated in Double-A.
League champ Hempfield, the defending district and state champ, received a bye into the Triple-A quarterfinals, and will compete in Pool B on Wednesday at 4:30 p.m. at Central York High School along with Carlisle, Central Dauphin and host CY.
CV’s season is over, but the Bucks made it interesting, rallying from a 20-14 deficit to beat Hershey in the first game, but the Trojans rallied to win the next two.
In the third game, CV dug out from a 17-6 hole and sliced Hershey’s lead to 24-23.
CV also gave Wyomissing, the Berks County champ, a tussle, rolling to a 7-0 lead in the third game. But the Spartans stormed from behind and won 25-22 — clinching the match.
“When we got up 7-0 I really thought we had them,” Lor said. “But they came back on us and totally took us out of our game.”
CV has played a slew of volleyball games lately. The Bucks played last Monday and Tuesday in the L-L League playoffs, had to beat Manheim Central last Wednesday just to advance to Districts, and then fell to Hempfield on Thursday in the league championship match.
“I think we lost our mojo,” CV coach Al Kofroth said. “I think the kids were tired from last week.”
When the Bucks took on West York in their third and final match, both teams were 0-2 and knew they weren’t going to advance.
West York won the first two games to clinch the match before CV, with Kofroth playing all of his seniors one last time, closed it out with a 25-20 win, sparked by Nick Stoltzfus, who had 10 kills against WY.
Chris Cannon pounded out 22 kills and had 11 blocks, Joseph Hughes added 22 kills and Kevin Wile had 16 kills and five blocks for CV.
“It’s been tiring,” Lor admitted. “Maybe we’ve been playing a little too much volleyball. But we had a fun season.”
In Monday’s Triple-A matches at Central York:
Cedar Cliff 3,
Manheim Township 1
In Pool A play, the Colts topped the Blue Streaks 26-24, 22-25, 25-16, 25-22 and eliminated Township from the postseason.
Dallastown 3, Penn Manor 0
Also in Pool A play, Jordon Weber had seven kills and Zac Alexakos had four blocks for the Comets, but Dallastown won by game scores of 25-20, 25-22, 25-11 and sent Penn Manor packing.
Central Dauphin 3, Warwick 1
In Pool B play, the Warriors won the second game to make things interesting, but the Rams won 25-10, 22-25, 25-10, 25-20 and eliminated Warwick.
And in Double-A:
Pool B — At Dallastown, Garden Spot topped Reading Central Catholic 2-1 and Oley Valley 3-0 and finished second in the pool behind Eastern York, which topped the Spartans 3-0 and went 3-0.
Garden Spot will play Wednesday at 6 p.m. at Lower Dauphin against Pool C champ Northeastern.
Dan Smucker came up big for the Spartans with 12 kills against RCC and eight against EY, while Dean Wanner had four blocks against RCC and 11 kills against Oley Valley.
Pool C — At Hempfield, Mennonite finished second in the pool, topping Twin Valley 3-0 and Exeter 3-0 before falling to pool champ Northeastern 3-0.
The Blazers will play Wednesday at 6 p.m. at Northern York against Pool B champ Eastern York.
Kendall Garber had a huge night above the net for Mennonite, racking up 37 kills, including 15 against Exeter.
Pool D — At Gettysburg, Manheim Central topped Brandywine Heights 2-1, but the Barons fell to pool champ Northern York 2-1 and to Spring Grove 3-0 and were eliminated.
