Fate was on the side of the Buchholz volleyball team on Wednesday night.
Facing a 23-17 deficit in the opening set to rival GHS, the Bobcats rallied and won the first two sets in a 27-25, 25-21, 26-28, 25-20 victory against the Hurricanes at Bud Seymour Gymnasium.
The victory, Buchholz’s first against GHS since 2021, snapped a 9-game losing streak in the series.
“It’s awesome,” said Buchholz coach Andre Medina. “When I first got the coaching job here, everyone told me that GHS and Buchholz are the two rivals, football or whatever sport it is, so yeah, it’s awesome to definitely break that streak. But it’s definitely going to be tough to go to their place (Oct. 2) and do the same thing again.”
The visiting Hurricanes (7-5) appeared to be headed for a win in the opening set after consecutive kills by junior Kenzie Carter-Mitchell (9 kills) gave GHS a 23-17 advantage.
“It was grit and trusting in the plan,” Medina said. “We talked about it right before the game, ‘hey, we’ve done all this preparation to beat this team, and what do we have to do in order to win,’ and we just have to go trust it. And for them, it’s really tough for players to be down six and losing in a match, doing what a coach has asked them to do, but for them to still trust in the plan and go, ‘we’re going to ride with it. We’re going to keep going with it, and we’re going to trust the process.’ Just a shout-out to the kids again. They did an awesome job.”
Following a service error by GHS, the Bobcats reeled off four consecutive points, including a pair of kills by sophomore Aubrey Waters (12 kills).
GHS got it to set point (24-22) on a kill by sophomore Jacey Carter-Mitchell, but Buchholz answered by scoring four of the next five points for a 27-25 win.
“Give it up to Buchholz, they were digging a lot of our stuff and just hustling to get it back on our side,” said GHS coach Jerica Carter-Mitchell. “They were playing really scrappy tonight, so we really had to work and execute on our side.”
The second set showed what many who were in attendance saw: that both teams were equally talented and both teams played hard.
There were 15 ties in the second set.
“I think that both teams are so evenly matched across the board, talent level-wise, and just positionally,” Medina said. “We’ve got big middles; they’ve got big middles. We’ve got big pins; they’ve got big pins. They’re gritty defenders; we’ve got gritty defenders, so it was just really well matched. The last few weeks, we’ve had some pretty tough losses, and our preparation and our response after those losses has kind of helped us here, and so this is a combination of that. Just kudos to all the kids for buying in and executing the game plan.”
Buchholz (3-2) took the lead for good at 17-16 on an attack error and closed out the set with an ace by sophomore Aaliyah Ray (7 kills, 4 blocks).
“Her big job today was kind of like a decoy, per se,” Medina said. “We probably didn’t set her as much as she would have liked, but I think if you go back and watch the film, you’ll see how much attention that she got whenever we got a good pass, and that really opened it up. Taylor’s (Sembower) 18 kills, I would give half of those to the fact that Aaliyah held the middle, and so she did her role and got a ton of huge blocks when we needed them.”
Gainesville built as much as a 5-point lead in the third set (18-13), but Buchholz came back to set up match point following a kill by Ray for a 26-25 lead.
However, the Hurricanes rallied with a kill in the middle by Jacey Carter-Mitchell (9 kills, 3 blocks) and a net violation to edge the Bobcats, 28-26, and force a fourth set.
“That was good,” Jerica Carter-Mitchell said. “We needed that. We had to at least win a set here. That was good for our morale, and that gave us some more confidence going into the fourth set.”
In the fourth set, Ray had a pair of aces, and Sembower added a couple of kills during a 6-0 run to overcome an early 8-6 deficit.
Sembower also added two kills late, including the game-winner for a 25-20 victory in four. The freshman finished with a game-high 18 kills.
“For a freshman to stay in the game the entire time, understand all that we’re asking of her and to do all the things that we’re asking over at a very high clip, very consistently, is something that is just an understatement,” Medina said. “Having her in the program is awesome, and we kind of sleep well at night knowing she’s on our side of the court.”
Senior Rowan Kage added eight kills and four blocks for GHS, who, along with Buchholz, will play at this weekend’s Jacksonville Juniors Volleyball Association (JJVA) Tournament featuring some of the top teams in Florida.
