WILMINGTON — Padua fought off four set points for a comeback win in the fourth set, holding off a tough St. Georges squad in a 3-1 win Nov. 3 in the second round of the DIAA volleyball tournament. Set scores were 16-25, 25-18, 25-20 and 26-24.
The first three points of the match were a good indication of how that first set would play out. After a Padua error, Kayla Riley blasted consecutive kills to put the Hawks up, 3-0. The Pandas found themselves down later in the set by a 19-11 score before they went on a 5-0 run that included two kills for Aanya Yatavelli, a dink for Hannah McGuigan and an ace for Avery Pilger.
Those, however, would be the final points of the set for Padua. The Hawks scored the final six to take the early lead.
Padua opened the second with a 4-1 lead before St. Georges took the lead on a 5-0 run. The set was tied, 9-9, when the Pandas scored three straight to take the lead for good. The Hawks cut the deficit to 12-11, but a service error was the first of four straight for the Pandas. With the score sitting at 21-18, the Pandas began a set-winning run with kill from Pilger. Yatavelli ended an impressive rally with a smash, and she repeated the performance to get it to set point. Pilger took care of the rest, delivering an ace to tie the match at a set apiece.
Padua’s lead to begin the third set was 5-1, but again, St. Georges battled back. Riley had three kills in a 4-1 stretch, including a bomb from the back line that cut the Pandas’ lead to 6-5.
The teams were tied a number of times until it was 12-12 following a kill from the Hawks’ Rayna Farris. A Libby Neiburg dink kicked off a streak of four in a row for the Pandas that concluded with consecutive aces for Ally Lang. The lead grew to 20-14 on a MeGuigan smash, but the Hawks tried one more rally. They got to within a pair, but Kaitlyn Leberstien ended the third with a block.
Riley continued her hard-hitting highlight reel of a match into the fourth as St. Georges went ahead early. The teams were at each point between 5-5 and 8-8 before Leberstien fired off two aces to put Padua on top by a pair. The Hawks were not flustered, however, and answered with the next seven, six of which were courtesy of Pandas errors. The other was another blast from Riley.
Padua cut the deficit to two, but the Hawks recovered and found themselves up, 20-15, and five points from a fifth set. A push kill by Farris made it 22-18, but Neiburg answered with a push of her own. A violation was called, however, when the Pandas took too long to serve, extending the Hawks’ lead to 23-19.
Vanessa Mancini got one back for Padua on a tap, but Riley sent a bomb into the floor to get it to set point. Neiburg kept the set going with a block of Riley, and the Hawks called timeout. An attack error made it a one-point game, and Kaitlyn Maus split two St. Georges players for an ace to tie. On her next serve, the receive went back toward the net, and McGuigan reached up to stuff it. Now, on match point for the Pandas, McGuigan struck again, sending an attack off the hands of a St. Georges defender and to the floor.
Padua’s statistics were not available late Friday night. The Pandas (10-6) will travel to Ursuline on Nov. 9 for a quarterfinal matchup with the Raiders beginning at 6:30 p.m. Ursuline swept Appoquinimink on Friday night to advance.
Riley had 19 kills and three aces for the Hawks. Erica Faedtke had 21 digs, and Alexandra McCorkle added 13. St. Georges finished the season 12-5.
All photos by Mike Lang.
