Albemarle drops Westfield for Group AAA title

RICHMOND — After 20 seasons, Albemarle head coach and Virginia’s all-time wins leader Mark Ragland finally has his state title.

“Everybody starts out the season wanting to win a state title, but it comes to a point where you’ve got to put everything into it,” Ragland said. “For the last two weeks I feel like that’s what we’ve done.”

The Patriots picked up their first-ever volleyball title with a 3-1 (27-25, 25-16, 19-25, 25-22) win over Westfield in the Group AAA final at Virginia Commonwealth University’s Siegel Center on Saturday night in front of a decidedly pro-Albemarle crowd. According to the VHSL record book, it’s also the first state volleyball title in Central Virginia history.

As usual, Laura Gomez and Kara Elder carried the scoring load, with Elder ripping 20 kills and coming up with three blocks. Gomez was a defensive force with 10 blocks and 10 kills.

Gomez knocked down a kill after Westfield had opened up a 19-17 lead in game four, then turned to her teammates without much celebration, urging them to pick it up. The gesture seemed to indicate that it was time for the Patriots to get down to business.

“We really didn’t want to go to a fifth game,” Gomez said. “We were all just physically and emotionally drained, we just had to get that short burst of energy.”

Albemarle took control shortly thereafter, scoring five straight points after being down 22-20. Sara Deal had a block and then a quick kill off a ricochet to finish the Bulldogs off on the last two points and set off a dogpile celebration near the net.

“I knew we could win it and anyone could have put it away. I just happened to get the ball hit to me,” Deal said. “I was determined to finish it right then, so I just smacked it and it went down.”

Albemarle’s victory completed a Cinderella run to the finals. The Patriots’ three losses on the year all came at the hands of district foe Colonial Forge, and the Patriots played out the entire regional bracket on the road to earn a Northwest Region title and a berth in the state tournament. Albemarle got there largely on the strength of its defense, which again kept alive a startling number of tough balls and came up with 29 blocks as a team against the Bulldogs in the title game.

“I think for the last two weeks that we’ve played the best defense that we’ve ever played in the history of Albemarle volleyball,” Ragland said. “Our hitters are great, but our defense is what carried us.”

Deal had 12 blocks and three kills in the match. She and Hannah Lawson, who had 10 kills, were strong enough throughout the contest that Westfield could never load up against Gomez and Elder.

In its first state title game appearance, Westfield struggled to account for the Patriots’ multi-pronged attack, but fought valiantly throughout and won the third game. The Patriots looked out of sorts during that stretch and part of game two, with several hitting errors and a number of uncharacteristic mistakes.

“We started getting down toward the end because a few of us were not blocking or hitting or passing or setting,” said setter Abby Hendrix. “We had a couple of little runs where we were just down on ourselves. I thought in game four we got back and brought it up emotionally.”

Hendrix’s passing made a big difference during the final game, and the 5-foot-4 junior came up with a momentum-building block in the first game. Game one was a seesaw battle, with Westfield taking a 24-23 lead on an Emma Stewart kill after the Patriots had led 13-11 earlier in the match.

“We knew we had to start out strong because coach tells us that the first game is where we need to get it started,” Elder said.

A Lawson kill on a rebound finally put the Patriots up again at 26-25, then a hitting error by Westfield gave Albemarle the early edge.

This was the Patriots’ third appearance in the title game, with both previous trips ending at the hands of sweeps by Frank W. Cox in 1996 and 1999. The Patriots bested Cox 3-1 in the quarterfinal round of the tournament at home, then edged out Chantilly in the semifinals 3-2 at the Siegel Center.

Albemarle was close to not even advancing to the region tournament in late October when the Patriots barely pulled out a 3-2 victory over Stafford at home in the first round of the district playoffs. Ragland said all he had to do to make sure the Patriots didn’t take a team for granted was mention Stafford.

“It just shows how far we’ve come,” Gomez said. “Just over two weeks ago we were about to lose to Stafford and now we just won states. We barely got out of our district and we just won states.”