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By EASportsToday.com
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Updated: October 3, 2016

Jacksonville outduels Pleasant Valley to win Calhoun County Volleyball Tournament in 5; Stone named MVP

Tournament MVP Sierra Stone had 16 kills and 13 blocks in the title match, 42 kills and 25 blocks in the tournament. (All photos by B.J. Franklin/GungHo Photos)

By Al Muskewitz
East Alabama Sports Today

JACKSONVILLE — Sierra Stone came up big in the biggest game.

The senior middle who has the size and strength to take over any game had 16 kills and 13 blocks Monday night as Jacksonville rallied twice to even the match and then defeated top-seeded Pleasant Valley 3-2 at Pete Mathews Coliseum for the Calhoun County Volleyball Tournament title.

“I really liked Sierra today,” Jacksonville coach David Clark said. “She played to her potential most of the day. I’m not sure everybody else did, but I thought Sierra did. I felt she really had a drive to be a good player today and be the player for us, which is who she needs to be.”

The third-seeded Lady Golden Eagles won their 10th county title since 2000 and ninth since 2005 in the closest championship match in tournament history; both teams scored 110 points. They lost the first game 25-22, won the second 25-23, lost the third 25-22, won the fourth 26-24 and won the tiebreaker 15-13, clinching it on Aniyah Robinson’s match-ending spike.

It was the second year in a row the tournament final went to five games. Oxford defeated Pleasant Valley last year.

PV pulled away late in the first game to grab the early advantage and was serving ahead 23-22 in Game 2. Jacksonville led Game 3 until PV scored the final four points, and trailed 24-23 in Game 4. The champions were down 11-10 in the tiebreaker before winning five of the last seven points.

The Lady Eagles (30-8) are 21-1 since making Tatiyana Thomas their full-time setter and flipping their outside hitters.

“I think for this group this is really big,” Clark said. “We lost in the semifinals of the state tournament last year; a lot of these kids have never been in a situation like this, at least as players, so I thought it was tremendous for them to be in this atmosphere before we hopefully get to the state tournament and are in a situation where it’s do-or-die.”

The teams played a regular-season match last Tuesday at Jacksonville with the Lady Eagles winning in two close sets, but neither team played particularly well. This match had all the intensity of a championship final, with numerous spirited points that featured exceptional digs to keep rallies alive.

There were eight ties in the first game, 13 in the second, 10 in the third, four in the fourth and five in the fifth. There were four lead changes in the first, second and fifth games.

“It’s not probably the best match we’ve played,” Clark said. “It’s probably one where they’ve showed me the most heart in a match that we’ve played.”

The Lady Eagles, in the finals for the 11th time in the last 12 years, looked as if they were about to seize control of the match in the third game. They never gave up the lead until the Lady Raiders (32-4) scored the final four points to lead two games to one.

Jacksonville forced the tiebreaker by scoring the final three points of Game 4 after PV took a 24-23 lead and served for the match.

“This is amazing,” senior libero Reagan Stallings said. “The first couple games we were kind of struggling, trying to all get that same tempo, that same level, and we didn’t reach our full potential, but to me good comes out of playing bad because that just shows you how well you can fight, how much you have in you.

“We didn’t play bad at all, we just didn’t play our best and we figured out really how tough we can be, especially when it matters. It got late into games and were like 24-24, things like that late, and we still pushed through. That’s more important than just flying through because that means if we ever get down in the future we’ll be able to fight back, and once we put that together, it’ll be good.”

Stallings was named the tournament’s defensive MVP; she had 38 digs and seven assists in the title match, 27 assists and 139 digs in the tournament. Pleasant Valley’s Cammy Cochran was the tournament’s offensive MVP; she had a match-high 20 kills in the title match (45 in the tournament), two aces and served at 100 percent.

The big question after the match was what were the Lady Eagles going to do with the poster the bracket they were handed along with their hardware. It was too big to fit in somebody’s car and certainly too big to fit in the school’s trophy case.

“I’m not sure where it’s going to go,” Clark said. “They’ll probably put it in the locker room and use it the rest of the year to look at motivation-wise.

“They’ve kept them. The ones we’ve had before, those teams have always kept them. If they were paper ones, they roll them up and carry them around the rest of the year, when they went to the state tournament and stuff like that and put them up, just as a reminder of what they’ve accomplished and what they need to continue to do.”

Jacksonville’s Caitlyn Ryan (8) gets excited as the Lady Eagles get closer to winning the county volleyball tournament.

Championship Match
JACKSONVILLE 3, PLEASANT VALLEY 2
(22-25, 25-23, 22-25, 26-24, 15-13)

KILLS (45) – Jacksonville: Elizabeth Poe 14, Aniyah Robinson 10, Sierra Stone 16, Sarah Lumpkin 5; Pleasant Valley (61): Cammy Cochran 20 kills, Anna Bryant 10, Alisa St. John 17, Blakely Malsy 5, Mikayla Kendrick 6, Savannah Williams 3.

ASSISTS (117) – Jacksonville: Elizabeth Poe 7, Aniyah Robinson 2, Sierra Stone 2, Sarah Lumpkin 1, Reagan Stallings 7, Tatiyana Thomas 95, Brooke Murphy 1, Carol Meehan 2; Pleasant Valley (47): Anna Bryant 24, Savannah Williams 23.

ACES (4) – Jacksonville: Aniyah Robinson 1, Sierra Stone 2, Tatiyana Thomas 1; Pleasant Valley (5): Cammy Cochran 2, Anna Bryant 1, Alisa St. John 2.

DIGS (128) – Jacksonville: Elizabeth Poe 38, Aniyah Robinson 4, Sierra Stone 2, Reagan Stallings 38, Tatiyana Thomas 12, Brooke Murphy 12, Carol Meehan 3, Caitlyn Ryan 19; Pleasant Valley (102): Cammy Cochran 10, Anna Bryant 22, Alisa St. John 19, Blakely Malsy 6, Mikayla Kendrick 5, Savannah Williams 13, Madison Bentley 23, Taylor Williams 4.

BLOCKS – Jacksonville (32): Elizabeth Poe 1, Aniyah Robinson 2, Sierra Stone 13, Sarah Lumpkin 7, Tatiyana Thomas 8, Carol Meehan 1; Pleasant Valley (11): Cammy Cochran 2, Anna Bryant 2, Blakely Malsy 6, Mikayla Kendrick 1.

ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM
MVP – Sierra Stone, Jacksonville
Offensive MVP – Cammy Cochran, Pleasant Valley
Defensive MVP – Reagan Stallings, Jacksonville
Aniyah Robinson, Jacksonville
Tatiyana Thomas, Jacksonville
Elizabeth Poe, Jacksonville
Alisa St. John, Pleasant Valley
Anna Bryant, Pleasant Valley
Madison Bentley, Pleasant Valley
JoJo Skinner, Oxford
Nyia Archie, Oxford
Taylor Spradling, Alexandria
Catelynn Howell, Alexandria
Maiya Northard, Saks
Madison Gaines, Donoho
Cornelia Simpson, Faith Christian
Isabella Pinto, White Plains

Jacksonville’s Reagan Stallings (R) was named the tournament’s outstanding defensive player. She is excited for what winning the tournament means for the Lady Eagles going forward.