Warriors cap long day at state volleyball tourney with win over Knights

ANCHORAGE — Last week, the Wasilla Warriors entered the Northern Lights Conference Championships as the top seed and host of the region tournament. On the first day of the tourney, fourth-seeded Colony upset the top-seeded Warriors. Colony rode the momentum to an NLC title, and Wasilla was forced to settle for third place.

Fast-forward a week.

Friday, Wasilla had another crack at its rival, and the Warriors prevailed.

Wasilla posted a 3-1 (25-23, 25-18, 13-25, 25-19) win over the Knights during the second day of the ASAA/First National Bank 4A State Volleyball Championships at the Alaska Airlines Center in Anchorage.

“We won where it counted,” Wasilla senior Lindsey Cizek said. “Now we’re moving on.”

With the win, Wasilla stayed alive in the double-elimination tournament, but fell just short of a spot in the state title match. Dimond scored a 3-0 (25-22, 25-16, 25-8) win over the Warriors Saturday morning. Dimond moved ahead to the state title match, and earned the 2016 crown, beating South Anchorage 3-2, and then topping the Wolverines 30-20 in the tiebreaker.

Wasilla finished third overall in the bracket. Colony was eliminated with the loss to Wasilla, and finished fourth in the 2016 bracket.

“We were definitely looking forward to a match,” Wasilla head coach Josie Cannon said Friday night of a possible rematch with the Knights. “It’s a great opportunity to do it in the third-place match. Colony’s a solid team, a solid top-4 team.”

The match also capped long days for both teams. The match was originally scheduled for 5 p.m. and was to be played in the Alaska Airlines Center’s auxiliary gym. But the tournament was behind schedule most of the day, really behind in the auxiliary gym. When the clock hit 5 p.m., the match scheduled prior to the Wasilla-Colony match had just began, and UAA had a women’s basketball game scheduled on that court with an 8 p.m. tip.

Thanks to the delay, ASAA moved the Colony-Wasilla match from it’s 5 p.m. time on the auxiliary court, and decided to put the Warriors and Knights on the main court following the conclusion of the South-Dimond 4A championship semifinal.

The Colony-Wasilla match didn’t start until 8 p.m.

“It was a struggle to stay warm the whole time,” Cizek said. “You’re up on the track and moving, and then you’re coming down and sitting down. I think we warmed up like four times for this match alone. It’s a lot of just mentally staying in the game.”

Cannon said she was proud of the way her kids handled the adversity.

“We were told to play in two different locations, we had two different locker rooms,” Cannon said. “It really shows their mental strength to step on the court at 8 o’clock at night when we were supposed to play at 5.”

It was also the second match of the day for the Warriors. Wasilla swept its other rival, Palmer, 3-0 in a match that started at 1:30 p.m.

As rough as it was for Wasilla, the Knights were dealt an even tougher hand. Colony’s match with Wasilla was its third of the day. The Knights started its first match and its third match Friday almost exactly 12 hours apart.

Colony, which suffered a first-round loss to South Anchorage early Thursday morning, started its day Friday in an 8 a.m. match against Juneau-Douglas. The Knights beat the Crimson Bears 3-0, and moved forward to face Bartlett at 11:30 p.m. Colony notched another win, beating the Golden Bears 3-1.

Wasilla won its first-round match on Thursday.

“It really was huge,” Cannon said of the first-round win. “Especially with the schedule the way it is this year. You don’t want an 8 a.m. game. Colony got the rough end of the stick, and really did a good job with it. But it was a long day for them.”

The Moose also played a pair of matches on the busy Friday for Valley squads. Palmer beat West Valley 3-1 Friday morning to stay alive, but saw its season come to an end with the loss to Wasilla.

Palmer finished fifth in the tourney. All three Valley teams finished among the top five in the tourney.

“I’m so proud of the Valley. We really represented,” Cannon said. “We represented in our region, and we came to state and are at least three, four, five. I think that’s really saying something for the strength of our skills. We’ve really grown.”

Contact Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman sports editor Jeremiah Bartz at sports@frontiersman.com.