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Semifinal showdown set Thursday

By Jim Wexell For The 4 min read

Geibel Catholic, Frazier volleyball teams win HERMINIE – The wins Tuesday night by Geibel Catholic and Frazier were expected. The manner by which each of those girls’ volleyball teams won, however, was not.

Frazier coach Mandy Hartman said her girls played “a near flawless match” in knocking off Elderton.

But Geibel coach Rick Watkins wasn’t nearly as pleased with his team’s win over Bentworth.

“That’s about as poorly as we played all year,” said Watkins. “I think more than anything we had a real lack of confidence in the whole match and I don’t know why. That’s not indicative of the way we’ve played this year.”

Geibel finished second to Frazier in section play this season, but both teams went into the WPIAL Class A playoffs highly seeded. Geibel was seeded third and Frazier was second behind perennial powerhouse Farrell.

Geibel and Frazier will meet Thursday in the semifinals at a time and site to be determined. Both teams have also qualified for the PIAA Tournament. That didn’t seem to satisfy Watkins much, even though only one of Geibel’s first seven players is a senior.

“Yes, we’re young. But to say we’re inexperienced, that would be a lie,” he said. “We’ve been through the mixer in Juniors, summer leagues. They know what it takes to play in big matches. I’m not going to make excuses. We played poorly; Bentworth played well. They probably should’ve won the match.”

Geibel won 3-1 by scores of 25-15, 22-15, 33-31 and 25-20. Statistically, sophomore middle hitter Natalie Hozak led the way with 16 kills. Freshman outside hitter Samantha Hawk had 11 kills. Junior Abbie Renze had 12 service points.

Is there anything Watkins liked about the match?

“The final score. That’s about it,” he said. “Our serving was poor, our passing was horrible, our blocking was average. It bailed us out a couple times but we were even lacking in that area. Offensively we couldn’t get enough going because our passing wasn’t there.

“We haven’t played well, in my eyes, in over a week. We played poorly against Avonworth and we played poorly last Saturday up at West Shamokin in a tournament. I don’t know what funk we’re in but I hope we get out of it by Thursday.”

Thursday will mark Geibel’s third match against Frazier this season. In the first match, Frazier won in the full five games. In the season finale at Geibel, Frazier won in three games.

Frazier was in sweep mode again last night on the back end of the doubleheader at Yough. After waiting nearly two hours for Geibel to beat Bentworth, Frazier dispatched of Elderton in 45 minutes by scores of 25-10, 25-7 and 25-11.

While Geibel has one power hitter in Hozak, Frazier has at least three in Holly Smith, Brooke Carson and A.J. Morgan. Frazier also uses six seniors among its first eight players. That size, power and poise was on display last night.

“We came out and did what we needed to do,” said Hartman. “We’ve been working so hard at coming out and putting teams away. We’ve let teams come back a little bit and then pushed when we’ve needed to, but tonight we did what was needed. They kept going and going and the result was a near flawless match for them. Our serving, passing, setting and hitting all seemed to come together for us.”

Hartman believes Frazier is heading into its match with Geibel playing at a peak. But even though Frazier has won both matches this season, all but one of the eight games have been decided by three points or less.

“I wanted this to look like the No. 2 team playing the No. 7 team,” Hartman said. “That was important for us to do. Sometimes we have a tendency to play down to the level of our competition.

“I’m proud of them. I’m proud of their winning attitude and the way that they’re finally putting teams away. But Thursday’s going to be a beauty.”

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