'Hot Hand' Helps Romeo Land Class A Title
November 22, 2014
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
BATTLE CREEK – Romeo volleyball coach Stacy Williams didn’t feel comfortable Saturday until her team needed only one more point to win the MHSAA Class A Final.
That made sense for a couple of reasons.
At that point in the fifth set, Romeo led Novi by five points. That was much more comfortable than when the Bulldogs were falling in the third and fourth games after winning the first two.
But the most sizable reason for her brief moment of relief was 6-foot-1 junior Gia Milana – the “hot hand” and talk of this season’s Finals at Kellogg Arena.
Like she had 28 times already, Milana rocketed one final kill to give Romeo its first MHSAA championship since 1997 with a 25-23, 25-22, 14-25, 25-27, 15-9 victory.
The Bulldogs entered the weekend with five hitters tallying at least 147 kills this season and talked of a plan to spread the attack. But Milana had 19 kills in a three-set Semifinal win over top-ranked Temperance Bedford, and her 29 Saturday tied for sixth-most in MHSAA Finals history since the start of rally scoring in 2004-05.
“The plan from the beginning was to spread the ball out like usual. We like covering our middles, confusing their blocks, but today it was feed the hot hand,” Milana said. “The hot hand wins.
“I wanted (the ball) to go to whoever would put it away, because all I wanted was to win. But feed the hot hand. That’s what (setter) Lauren (Korth) did, and we got it done.”
Romeo (45-8-1) took those final steps this season after making the Quarterfinals in 2013. Friday’s Semifinal was the team’s first since 1999; the Bulldogs entered the tournament ranked No. 8 but dispatched the No. 1 Kicking Mules 25-14, 25-23, 25-9.
Novi – playing in its first championship match – was No. 2 at the start of the postseason and had beaten Romeo in a tournament final during the regular season – although Romeo didn’t have a full lineup for that event. The Wildcats finished 54-6-1 after making the Semifinals for the second time in program history.
Milana had six kills in the final set, her second-most of the five although the fifth is played to only 15 points.
She had only two as Romeo, leading 2-0, dropped the third set to Novi, which then won the fourth despite 11 Milana kills.
That had to be a good sign for Novi, which also had dropped the first two sets in its Semifinal win over Grand Haven on Friday before coming all the way back.
“We played pretty disciplined defense. We’d done our scouting. We had shot charts where she likes the ball,” Novi coach Jennifer Cottrill said of Milana. “She just hit the ball so high, and our biggest player is 5-9ish, 5-10 maybe. She’s just hitting the ball over the block, and it wasn’t just her. That team passes well and sets her the ball where she needs it.”
Novi’s comeback came in part on the arm of junior Victoria Iacobelli, who had six of her team-high 19 kills during the third and fourth sets, and the defense of senior libero Jordan Massab, who had nine of her game-high 23 digs in those games.
With three kills by Milana, Romeo opened the fifth set up 7-2. Novi pulled to within two of the lead at 8-6, but two more Milana kills and four Novi errors turned into the Bulldogs’ closing 7-3 run.
“The balls didn’t drop. Ones we though we were going to score on, they picked those balls up,” Williams said of the third and fourth games. “What we lost in the third and fourth games was that first touch, the first ball, but that last game we really started passing the ball and getting it to our hitters.”
Korth, a senior, had 43 assists to go with 11 kills, 12 digs and five blocks for Romeo. Sophomore Jodie Kelly added 13 kills and 11 digs.
Junior Paulina Iacobelli and sophomore Alyssa Cummings both added 14 kills for Novi, and freshman Erin O’Leary’s 47 assists tied for seventh most in Finals history during the rally scoring era.
With so many key contributors on both sides expected to return, it would fair to anticipate these teams meeting in Battle Creek again in 2015.
“We have a lot of young players touching the ball a lot,” Cottrill said. “Just having this experience of being here and knowing what to expect will definitely help us.
PHOTOS: (Top) A pair of Romeo blockers wall off a Novi kill attempt during Saturday’s Class A Final against Novi. (Middle) Novi setter Erin O’Leary passes to a teammate. (Click for action photos and team photos from Hockey Weekly Action Photos.)
VIDEO HIGHLIGHTS:
NOVI IMPRESSES - Novi turned the tables in the third set against Romeo, winning in impressive style. Alyssa Cummings smashes the ball for the set point.
MILANA BRINGS IT HOME - Romeo captured the Class A crown in five sets over Novi, the winner coming on this kill by Gia Milana.
You can watch the whole game and order DVDs by Clicking Here.
Monroe St Mary Rising to Repeat Mode
November 13, 2020
By Doug Donnelly
Special for Second Half
MONROE – Flip the Switch.
Every year, Monroe St. Mary Catholic Central head coach Karen O’Brien comes up with a catchphrase that she can use in conversations with her team for motivation.
This year, O’Brien picked the phrase “Flip the Switch,” which signals that MHSAA Tournament time is the time the Kestrels need to turn their game up a notch if they want to repeat as Division 3 champions.
“We know we have a goal we want to accomplish, and we are working hard to get there,” said SMCC senior Anna Dean. “There’s always another level that we can reach, every game.”
To this point, the Kestrels have answered the call. On Thursday, SMCC beat Manchester in straight sets to improve to 36-2 on the season and advance to Tuesday’s Quarterfinal against Bronson. O’Brien, in her sixth year coaching the Kestrels, said her team is making steady progress, but they still have potential to get better.
“We know we have another level we can raise our game to,” she said. “We haven’t played at that level yet in the playoffs. We know we need to flip the switch, mentally and physically, if we want to be at the next level.”
SMCC is a veteran team with seven seniors who have been playing together for years. Miss Volleyball finalist Mikayla Haut is joined by classmates Grace Lipford, Abbie Costlow, Jaydin Nowak, Kylie Barron, Anna Dean and Olivia Anderson. There are also five juniors and two sophomores on the postseason roster.
Haut is the second member of her family to be a Miss Volleyball finalist. Cassie Haut, now an assistant coach with the program, was a finalist in 2014 before becoming an all-Mid-American Conference player at Eastern Michigan University.
“I think Mikayla learned last year that she doesn’t have to carry us, she has to lead us,” O’Brien said.
Haut showed off her talent in the Regional held at Adrian Madison this week, at times dominating Tuesday’s match against Hudson and playing steady against Manchester.
“I think our biggest thing is just being consistent,” Haut said. “That’s what is going to get us to where we want to be.”
The Kestrels have put together an impressive resume to take with them into Tuesday’s Quarterfinal. In late October, O’Brien found an opening at a quad in Marshall where the Kestrels went and beat Marshall, ranked No. 10 in Division 2 at the time, Lake Odessa Lakewood, ranked No. 1 in Division 2, and Harper Creek, to go 3-0 on the day. SMCC also won its 10th consecutive Huron League title earlier this season. Haut and Barron have gone 55-1 in league play over their four-year careers.
SMCC’s only losses this fall were to Division 1 opponents Saline and Ann Arbor Skyline. Skyline, which beat Saline in this year’s District, will be playing in Tuesday’s Quarterfinals as well.
Costlow said the team believes in the Flip the Switch mentality.
“As we get to harder teams, we really need to flip that switch,” she said. “We have before. As we progress in the postseason, we need to get our game up.
“It’s a mental thing. It’s energy. When we bring that energy, we all move together and play as a unit, it's really fun.”
Costlow has worked on a jump float serve this year and is consistently one of the team’s best servers.
“The coaches have really been working with me with my hand contact and staying strong with it and not moving my wrist around,” she said. “I like contacting the ball higher. It floats and is hard to pass when it gets up into the air like that.”
Serving at a high level is important for the SMCC attack.
“Our goal is to serve tough so that their setters have a tough time getting anybody the ball,” O’Brien said.
When they are playing offense, the SMCC hitters seem to never stop coming at teams.
“I will be shocked if they don’t (win Division 3 again),” said Whiteford coach Buffy Ruddy after watching the Bobcats fall to SMCC in the District Final. “They have a great team. They have very good ball control, make very few errors and just have a really good balanced attack. They keep coming at you.”
O’Brien said the SMCC setters do a great job of distributing the ball.
“We have six hitters that can attack the ball,” she said. “We have certain plays called, but the setters do a good job of spreading the ball around. It can come from our middle or the right side. I think it’s a great thing. The opponents have to focus on three attackers every time.”
Costlow agreed.
“That’s one of the reasons we do so well,” Costlow said. “We have so many hitters that can put the ball down. The other team never knows where the ball is going to be set or who’s going to hit. It really messes up the other team.”
After seeing her team get past Manchester, Lipford said the Kestrels want more.
“We didn’t play to our full potential,” she said. “We would have liked it to be more decisive of a win. We need to start quicker, finish and play our game.
“From the very start we have to have that mentality.”
O’Brien is in her sixth year as head coach at SMCC. In 2018 her squad lost to Bronson in the Semifinals. Last year the Kestrels swept through the regular season and tournament, winning the school’s sixth Finals championship, and first under O’Brien, in a five-set thriller over Schoolcraft.
The win over Manchester was another start.
“I think individually we made steps, but as a team we are not there yet,” O’Brien said. “But we’ll be there on Tuesday.”
Doug Donnelly has served as a sports and news reporter and city editor over 25 years, writing for the Daily Chief-Union in Upper Sandusky, Ohio from 1992-1995, the Monroe Evening News from 1995-2012 and the Adrian Daily Telegram since 2013. He's also written a book on high school basketball in Monroe County and compiles record books for various schools in southeast Michigan. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Jackson, Washtenaw, Hillsdale, Lenawee and Monroe counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) SMCC’s Mikayla Haut (8) hits against Hudson’s Callie Bauer in their Regional Semifinal. Both Haut and Bauer are Miss Volleyball Award finalists. (Middle) Abbie Costlow (4) swings against Hudson. Costlow is one of seven seniors on the SMCC squad. (Below) The “Flip The Switch” T-shirt. (Action photos by Deloris Clark-Osborne.)