MORRISDALE - The Northern Cambria volleyball team got off to a slow start on Tuesday evening in the quarterfinals of the District 6 Class A playoffs at West Branch High School.
But once the fifth-seeded Lady Colts got rolling, not much could stop them.
Northern Cambria swept fourth-seeded Mount Union, 25-20, 25-14, 25-9.
"I think the girls were anxious to get going, and they were all trying a little bit too hard," Northern Cambria coach Mike Hogan said. "We had to get them settled down and concentrated on playing ball. I think once we got midway through game 1, we kind of got our game going a little bit. I was pretty happy with how it went from that point on."
The teams traded the lead back and forth for most of the first set, before the Lady Colts surged ahead on a seven-point service run by Elizabeth Wolfe.
Wolfe had 15 service points on the night.
"I thought our front row played well," Hogan said. "We blocked their big hitter [Taylor Miles] a few times. I really like that to start the match off, our first two or three balls we dug. You could tell their crowd was already cheering, and we dug the ball. That's what we have to do. We didn't win all of those points, but we dug them, and that sent a message."
Northern Cambria went on to win the set, 25-20, backed by three kills each from Wolfe and Giana Butterworth.
The Lady Colts didn't waste any time in the second set, pulling out to an early 7-1 lead off the serve of Megan Rescinito.
Northern Cambria had several big digs in the set, but the Lady Colts' front line stole the show most of the night.
Wolfe had a team-high nine kills and a block, while Becky Britton notched six kills. Reba Yahner and Butterworth each had four kills. Butterworth also had eight service points.
"We have to move the ball around and move it to different parts of the court," Hogan said. "Megan Rescinito and Giana Butterworth both did well from the line. Everyone did pretty good serving tonight for us."
After closing out the second set, 25-14, the Lady Colts made quick work of the Lady Trojans in the third set, 25-9.
Yahner finished the night with seven service points, while Ashley Delfonso had five service points. Rescinito had two kills, while Britton had 13 service points.
Northern Cambria improved to 15-4. The Lady Colts will play West Branch or Bellwood-Antis on Thursday at a site and time to be determined.
B-A match suspended
MORRISDALE - The match between top-seeded West Branch and eighth-seeded Bellwood-Antis was suspended in the middle of the second set after a townwide power outage due to a transformer fire.
After talking with the officials, the teams were given the option to play under the gym's emergency lights.
However, after discussing it with parents, Bellwood-Antis coach Annette Wilkins decided against it and opted to make the return trip back to West Branch at 6 p.m. tonight.
"It's pretty dark, and my first concern is the girls' safety," she said. "My gut feeling when the lights went out and they didn't come back on was that I didn't want to play in minimal light. When I went and conferred with the parents, they completely agreed 100 percent that they didn't want to see their kids play in the lower light, so that's why we made the decision. The safety of the girls outweighs us having to coming tomorrow."
West Branch won the first set, 25-12, and was leading the second set at 13-6 when the power outage occurred.
