CLARION, Pa. (EYT/D9) — Praylan Perkins admits it.
The members of the Oswayo Valley volleyball team have a gigantic chip on their shoulders.
The Green Wave surfed through last season undefeated, winning the District 9 Class A championship and made a run all the way to the PIAA quarterfinals.
But this year, some turbulent waters early in the season had Oswayo Valley feeling written off.
“I definitely think we were overlooked,” Perkins said. “But we showed up.”
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The Green Wave certainly did on Thursday night at Clarion, sweeping the Bobcats away in a tsunami of relentless attacks at the net and sound defense in the back row to earn a 26-24, 25-17, 25-18 victory to move on to a date with top-seeded Clarion-Limestone in the semifinals on Tuesday — Halloween night.
Oswayo Valley dressed up as the defending champs against Clarion and played like it, overcoming a 21-16 deficit in the first set to rally to win. The Wave held off Clarion in the second set and cruised to a win in the third.
“The girls, they work so hard and I pushed them pretty hard — I’m not gonna lie,” said first-year coach Emily Wolfe-Sullenger. “I know what they can do and they know what they can do and the confidence they have been gaining is huge. They are an amazing team, a unified team. They are awesome girls.”
And they are every bit as deadly at the net as they were last season.
Perkins and MaKenna Manning each had 11 kills and Olivia Cook pitched in 10 to lead the balanced attack.
“We have a big emphasis on not having just one player,” Wolfe-Sullenger said. “I love that teams don’t know where we’re going. They all utilize their skills so well. No player is overlooked on this team. They all have their moments, sometimes it’s a big moment, sometimes a small moment, but they all have them.”
Senior setter Laci Miller-Geiger had her moment on Tuesday, notching her 500th career assist.
On Thursday against Clarion, she shined again.
Miller-Geiger had never played volleyball until this year, giving Wolfe-Sullenger quite the boon in her first year at the helm.
“I knew she was an athlete. You could tell,” Wolfe-Sullenger said. “I didn’t know if I wanted to put her in the back row, or at setter. I was like, ‘No, she can do it. She can set.’ She was our best option for sure.”
Oswayo Valley has been on a roll over the past month after dropping a few matches in September.
“There’s perks to losing matches early on in the season,” Wolfe-Sullenger said. “I tell the girls that when you lose a match, that’s a great opportunity to learn from that. It can actually be a little bit of a humbling experience, but you have to make sure to stay in the right mindset. They did.
“Absolutely, this team thought they were going to win, 100%,” Wolfe-Sullenger added. “We felt that coming into tonight even before we warmed up. People had already written us off early in districts. They had already put us out. But tonight was a good boost.”
It was a disappointing end to the season for Clarion, which was again playing without one of its top players, junior outside hitter Hadlee Campbell.
Campbell had missed several weeks with a shoulder injury, returned for the two Keystone Shortway Athletic Conference tournament matches last week, but shut things down again this week in the playoffs.
“You can see if you have Marley (Kline) and Hadlee opposite each other, it’s a really nice combination,” said Clarion coach Shari Campbell, who is also Hadlee’s mother. “We just need her to get healthy. She a great volleyball player. She’s watching film, watching the college game, helping coaching and taking stats and doing what she can. It’s tough to be injured, but you help the team the way you can.”
Kline had 12 kills and Addi Campbell had 24 assists, but she, too, was injured late in the match.
The lone senior, Taylor Alston, had two kills and eight digs for Clarion.
She’s the last holdover from the two PIAA Class A championship teams in 2020 and 2021.
“She’s had to make some position changes with injuries,” Campbell said. “Taylor has played just about everywhere. I’m super proud of her stepping into serve-receive stepping in for Hadlee. We needed someone with experience who was going to, when their back was against the wall, pass a serve and that’s something Taylor hadn’t been in a position to do prior to this year. It’s a testament to the athlete she is that she was able to do that and actually be our best serve-receiver this year.”
Clarion Area High School sports coverage on Explore and D9Sports.com is brought to you by Redbank Chevrolet and DuBrook.
