Warriors rebound, advance to state tourney

PALMER — With the next week’s state tournament hosted in Wasilla for the second straight year, the Wasilla Warriors wanted to make sure they’ll be a part of the big event in their hometown.

Wasilla also ensured no 4A teams will be making the trip from the Kenai Peninsula. Wasilla bounced Skyview and Soldotna out of the consolation bracket Saturday afternoon to finish third in the Northern Lights Conference Championships at Colony High School.

Wasilla used a 3-1 (20-25, 25-17, 25-18, 25-23) win over SoHi in the third-place match to secure the NLC’s final bid to the state tourney, just hours after sweeping Skyview 3-0 Saturday morning.

“We all want to go to state,” Wasilla head coach Claudia Farias Pinard said. “They’re almost all seniors. They want to be there.”

Wasilla scored its second win in three days over the Stars. The Warriors also beat SoHi in a first-round matchup Thursday afternoon. Even though the Stars fell to the Warriors twice, playing the same team twice didn’t make a difference, Soldotna head coach Bruce King said.

The NLC Championships was simply a competitive tournament.

“Virtually every match of this tournament has come down to the wire,” King said. “We fully expect that to be the case every time we play in this setting. There are six good, solid teams here, and any one of them could have won any match.”

The Stars won the first game of the match, thanks in part to the hitting of Kallee Skjold, who finished with a team-high 11 kills and 11 blocks.

Wasilla fell behind early, but won three straight games to score the victory. The Warriors’ rally was compounded by shaking the effects of a tough five-game loss to Palmer in the semifinals Friday night. The Warriors held a two-set lead in the match and enjoyed a 13-1 lead in the second game, but Palmer was able to power back to beat the Warriors and move into the finals.

“Me personally, I didn’t lose any faith (in my team),”Farias Pinard said. “It was really hard for us, yes, to put everybody’s head back into the game and be ready for two matches.”

Serving proved to be crucial to the Warriors’ ability to beat Soldotna in the third-place match. A handful of Warriors finished with multiple service aces, and even when Wasilla didn’t get the ace, King said he felt Wasilla’s jump serves was putting pressure on the SoHi defense.

“Serving is a main part of the Wasilla team,” Farias Pinard said. “It is really important to the team.”

Senior Sariah Tuisaula finished with nine aces in the match. The outside hitter recorded consecutive aces three times during the match, which included a run of three straight aces during a second-period run.

Senior Kayla Bell had four aces for Wasilla.

Tuisaula also led Wasilla with a match-high 25 kills in the win. Senior Haley Taylor recorded 11 kills and a match-high 27 digs. Senior Jolee Fife had 10 kills and five digs.

Sydney Goggia tallied eight kills and 11 total blocks for the Stars, while Julie Litchfield finished with a half-dozen kills. Kylee Woodford led Soldotna with 23 digs.

Rough ending

for host Knights

PALMER — The Colony Knights scored the upset of the first round of the NLC Championships, but had a rough two days to end the tourney.

After upsetting top-seeded Skyview on Thursday, Colony suffered a tough 3-2 (14-25, 16-25, 25-21, 25-21, 15-12) loss to Kodiak in the semifinals.

Colony’s season ended with a 3-1 (23-25, 25-23, 25-21, 25-19) loss to Soldotna in the consolation semifinals Saturday morning.

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