WILMINGTON — They’re neighbors and archrivals who were meeting for the third time this season, and Ursuline and Padua did not disappoint. On the night of Nov. 9, the Raiders and Pandas slugged it out for five sets before Ursuline prevailed and earned a spot in the DIAA semifinals with the 3-2 win. It is the Raiders’ first trip to the semis since 2019.
Set scores were 25-15, 23-25, 25-12, 16-25, and 15-10.
It was a bit of a strange night on the court in that just one of the first four sets was close. But there was plenty of big hits, tremendous defense and some sustained rallies to entertain the full house inside Laffey-McHugh Gymnasium.
Ursuline opened with the serve, and Emelia Panunto went right to work. She got the Raiders off to a 6-0 start with a pair of aces during her run, and although the Pandas would fight back, they never got closer than three. The Raiders’ big hitters — C.C. DeCaro, Claire Kelly and Caitlyn McGonigal among them — were finding open spaces, keeping the Pandas at bay. McGonigal went straight down with an attack to send it to set point, and Juliette Cummings ended it when she smacked down an overpass.
Padua led the second set, 5-3, then watched Ursuline tie the score before a service error restored a one-point lead for the Pandas. Padua would go on to score the next six points to open up a 12-5 lead, and they seemed well on their way to leveling the match.
Vanessa Mancini’s cross extended the lead to 14-6, and it the margin remained at eight points after Mancini smacked down a kill a few minutes later to make it 17-9. The Raiders, however, got a tap from Kelly to begin their comeback attempt. A 7-1 run that included an impressive Cummings block and a few DeCaro kills cut the Padua lead to 18-16.
The lead grew to 22-18 on a Hannah McGuigan block, and when Mancini smashed a ball into the floor a few points later, it was 23-20. But Kelly scored on a tap to begin a 3-0 Raiders surge, with a Timmons ace tying the score. A service error, however, gave the Pandas set point, and Kaitlyn Leberstien clinched it with an ace.
The Raiders responded with a 3-0 start in the third, and after an early comeback attempt by Padua, they never looked back. A 4-0 run for Padua got the Pandas to within two at 12-10, but the Raiders outscored the visitors, 13-2, to close out the set. DeCaro and Kelly were all over the scoresheet in the third, with DeCaro ending it with a kill.
Consecutive kills by DeCaro early in the fourth helped the Raiders to a 5-2 lead, but a bomb by Aanya Yatavelli started a 7-0 Pandas run that also included a tap kill by Avery Pilger and another block for McGuigan.
After a timeout, the Raiders got a smash and a block from Kelly, but Yatavelli helped keep the Pandas in front. Attacks by Kelly and Cummings, along with an attack error by Padua, the Ursuline to within one at 15-14, but Libby Neiburg tapped one that found the floor to start a 10-2 Padua run to end the set. Yatavelli was busy, scoring three of the Pandas’ final five points.
That forced a fifth and deciding set, the only one among the four quarterfinals played Thursday night. For the fifth straight set, the Raiders scored first, but Padua got a point when Mancini scored on a kill. With the score tied, 4-4, the Pandas took a two-point lead on two Raiders errors before Kelly hung in the air for a block for Ursuline.
Padua’s lead grew to 8-6 before a decisive move by the Raiders. Three unforced errors by the Pandas, followed by a blast by Cummings and a service winner and a Hayley Timmons ace, put Ursuline on top, 12-8. A line violation added another point to the lead, and with the Raiders’ student body at full volume, they brought the match to an end when DeCaro sent a blast down the left sideline, off a Panda and out of bounds.
DeCaro had 21 kills and 24 digs for the Raiders, who improved to 14-3. McGonigal had 9 kills and Tyler Adams 8, and Grace Burns paced the team with 43 digs. They’ll meet No. 9 Tower Hill on Nov. 13 at the Bob Carpenter Center at the University of Delaware at a time to be announced. It will be a rematch of a Sept. 12 match at Tower that was won by the Raiders, 3-1.
Tower Hill, the defending state champion, earned a spot in the semifinals with a 3-0 win at Saint Mark’s on Thursday.
Yatavelli had 13 kills for the Pandas, while McGuigan added seven, along with three blocks. Neiburg also had three blocks. Four players had at least 10 digs. Padua finished the season 10-7.
All photos by Mike Lang.
