CLAYMONT — It was senior night for Archmere’s volleyball team on Oct. 14, and MOT Charter almost made it a memorable occasion for the Auks for all the wrong reasons. The visiting Mustangs gave Archmere all it could handle, but the Auks captured the 3-1 win. Set scores were 25-21, 13-25, 25-19, and 25-20.
The Auks had their hands full with Lia Henderson, who anchors MOT Charter’s imposing front line. Henderson helped her team take a 10-7 lead in the first with a dink, followed by consecutive aces.
The Auks responded with six straight points, but this set was back and forth, tied six times between 15-15 and 21-21. Brooke Maddox scored on a cross to put the Auks on top, sparking a 4-0 run to end the set. Maddox had three of those points, wrapping up the first by sending an attack off the Mustangs’ block and to the floor.
The second set was all MOT. Korrin Gaines tied the set at 5-5 with a kill, and Henderson put them on top for good with an ace. A 9-1 run gave MOT Charter a 13-6 lead, and the Auks got no closer than five the rest of the way. Henderson was big throughout, scoring on a block and a kill before ending it with an absolute bomb.
A rejuvenated Archmere began the third set on the right track. Caroline Hahn began a 5-0 run, punctuated by a tap by Grace Mahoney (Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish), that made it 9-4, but the Mustangs would not go away. Henderson led a 6-0 run that included three aces in a row, although the Auks did not let the set get away from them.
The Mustangs took a late lead at 19-18 on an Archmere hitting error, but Mahoney tied it with a blast. Maddox followed with a winner, and MOT had an error of their own. Maddox scored again to send the score to 22-19, and she finished the 7-0 run to end the set with a deep attack.
The Auks had a 5-4 lead early in the fourth, but Lia Henderson started a 10-1 stretch for the Mustangs that included two kills for Adalia Carrion Rivera and two for McKinley Henderson, Lia’s sister. The lead remained at eight, 16-8, following a block by MOT’s Natalie Flowers.
Bridget Malloy (St. Thomas the Apostle, Glen Mills, Pa.) began the comeback with a bomb, and Burke followed suit. With the score 18-12 in favor of the Mustangs, the Auks scored five straight before McKinley Henderson got one back. Mahoney grabbed the spotlight late, scoring on three straight points to give Archmere the 21-20 advantage. Olivia Borsello followed with an ace off the tape, and MOT called timeout.
Mahoney got one more with a push kill over the back line defenders before Lia Henderson ended the 5-0 run. The Mustangs saved two match points after Mahoney’s final attack, but Maddox scored the winning point again, this time sending a shot off the hands of the Mustangs’ front line.
Mahoney finished with 16 kills, while Maddox had 13. The Auks (12-2) are off until Oct. 21, when they end the regular season at home against Newark Charter at 6:15 p.m.
MOT Charter saw its six-match winning streak come to an end. The Mustangs (9-4), whose four losses all have come against teams ranked in 302 Sports’ top 10, are home for their final two regular-season contests, beginning Thursday at 6 p.m. against Middletown.
Photos by Mike Lang.
