Carson's Makenzie Tucker serves against Bishop Manogue Tuesday night.
It was a Senior Night anybody associated with Carson High volleyball won’t soon forget for several reasons.
Consider the following:
• Carson, thanks to 94 team digs, 31 from freshman Abby Pradere, knocked Bishop Manogue from the ranks of the unbeaten with a 25-19, 27-25, 20-25 and 25-19 victory Tuesday night at Morse Burley Gym.
• Senior Juliana Anderson had her best hitting game of the season, reaching the 20-kill plateau for the first time this season in her last regular-season game ever before the home folks.
• The win moved Carson, 12-3, a step closer to hosting a first-round playoff game next Tuesday. The Senators entered the contest one game ahead of Damonte Ranch and needed either two wins this week or one Damonte loss to finish second.
This will go down as one of Maw’s biggest wins as a head coach.
“When I took this job, Carson was always a third or fourth-place team,” Maw said. “The last couple of years I think we’ve turned the corner. We’re going in the right direction. We have one girl over 6-foot, so we’re doing it with skill and athleticism.
“We moved Abby Pradere to libero when we were in Phoenix, and she had an absolutely great night. She brought us back several different times tonight with saves. We were trying to funnel everything to Abby, Jaycie (Roberts) and Juliana in the back. We played great defense tonight. We got our hands on a lot of balls.”
And, Padere wasn’t the only contributor in that area. Roberts added 20 digs, Juliana Anderson 14, and Natalie Anderson and Makenzie Tucker added 11 each. That group couldn’t have done their job without great blocking up front. Maddie Jergesen led the way with 10 blocks and Kylie Riske added eight. Natalie Anderson was also credited with seven blocks.
“Carson played with a lot of energy,” Manogue coach Jason Sterrett said. “They touched every ball. We came out flat. It’s like I told you before, Carson is a very good team.
“We have given them some time off, and we’ve taken our foot off the throttle. We didn’t pass the ball well, and if you don’t pass the ball well your hitters aren’t going to be able to do much.”
In the opening set, Carson scored nine of the game’s first 10 points and led by as much as nine, 16-7, at one point. The Senators had four of their five aces in the game during that surge. Three came from Tucker and one came from Roberts.
“We saw on film they weren’t moving their feet; weren’t going to the left well,” Maw said. “We tried to exploit that.”
Manogue closed to 16-13, but Carson regained control at 19-13 on kills by Roberts, Jergesen and Riske. Manogue closed to 23-19 on kills by Sara Pool and Julia Wenzel, but a kill by Juliana Anderson and an ace by Natalie Anderson ended the opening set.
Manogue used a 6-0 run, thanks to two aces by Katelyn Oppio to take a 19-13 lead. Carson stormed back with an 8-1 run, tying the game at 20. Jergesen and Juliana Anderson had two kills apiece while Riske added one. Roberts also added an ace.
Kills by Allie Reviglio and Oppio gave the Miners a 24-21 lead. Two kills by Riske and one by Juliana Anderson gave Carson a 25-24 lead. Reviglio tied it at 25, but a kill by Anderson and one by Riske gave CHS a commanding 2-0 lead in the match.
It was the second straight match where the Miners fell behind 2-0. They took three in a row from Douglas last Thursday, but that magic was missing on Tuesday.
The Miners did grab the third game, outscoring CHS 9-2 down the stretch for a 25-20 win. Carson made a couple of errors in the BM surge and Reviglio also had two kills for the league leaders.
Manogue bolted to a 6-1 lead in the fourth game, but the Senators kept chipping away, wiping out an 11-8 lead to go ahead 17-14 on a kill by Juliana Anderson. An ace serve by Wenzel and a Carson error enabled the Miners to close the gap to 17-16.
Juliana Anderson’s two kills and an ace by Natalie Anderson then led CHS.
Carson scored six of the last eight to pull off the biggest win in northern Nevada this year. Juliana Anderson was right in the middle of it.
“Juliana had a great night,” Maw said. “Her and Jaycie are peaking at the right time.”
“It’s huge (beating Manogue),” Anderson said. “We were playing as a team tonight; the best I’ve seen all season.
“We talked a lot about not getting caught up in the emotion of Senior Night. I think we turned it around and used it to our advantage.”