Spikers Battle To Five-Game Win

By Andy Hutchison

Throughout the campaign, Newtown High School’s girls’ volleyball team has either won or lost in fairly nondramatic fashion. Each match, until Monday’s clash with Bethel, ended in a 3-0 or 3-1 result. The Nighthawks finally got pushed — and forced an opponent for that matter — to a decisive fifth game. They pulled it out with a hard-fought 3-2 (18-25, 25-20, 22-25, 25-15, 15-8) win over the visiting Wildcats to improve to 13-3 overall (11-1 in South-West Conference play) with just two matches remaining before the start of the conference playoffs.

So does playing in a match that goes to a winner-take-all game serve as a helpful experience as the pressure-filled postseason approaches?

“I don’t think it can hurt,” Newtown Coach Tom Czaplinski said.

The coach was relieved and happy that his team pulled out the fifth game, especially knowing the match was very much up for grabs at that point. “It can go any way once you get to the fifth game,” he said.

Newtown jumped out to a 6-0 lead in the fifth and, after Bethel pulled to within 6-5, the Hawks pulled away once again. Senior Paige Kroha had two of her three kills in the decisive game to help Newtown pull this one out. “She stepped up. She played fantastic,” Czaplinski said of Kroha, who has had limited playing time but took full advantage of her opportunities on Senior Night.

The Nighthawk coach, however, wasn’t completely pleased with his team’s overall effort, citing serving and passing struggles as the reason this match against an 8-8 Bethel team went down to the wire. The Hawks had their moments with well-placed serves and nice setups, but Czaplinski is looking for a lot more consistency.

“Today was not a good day for us,” he said. “I think the girls have to stop expecting things to come to them and they have to work.”

The Hawks may not have been on top of their game but they did have to fight for this particular win after cruising to four consecutive 3-0 triumphs.

Newtown should earn a two or three seed behind Joel Barlow of Redding and, thusly, a first-round home match in the SWC tourney, which will get underway with quarterfinal round action on October 29.

In the win over Bethel, Caroline Kelly had five of the team’s 16 service aces. Mylis Post added four, and Kyle Dandrea contributed three. Sam Steimle led Newtown with 13 of the team’s 31 kills. Amanda Rowan added six kills, and Kelly had four. Meghan Logan and Dandrea had 15 and 11 assists, respectively. Courtney Escoda compiled 21 digs, Dandrea had 14, Logan eight, and Kelly six.

Down two games to one, the Nighthawks established a seemingly commanding 9-1 lead before Bethel climbed to within 10-7. A pair of Dandrea service points and Rowan’s soft touch over the net helped NHS to a 6-0 run and a 16-7 cushion and the Hawks never looked back.

In the fifth game, Post had a pair of service aces, one coming off a fortuitous kiss off the net, and some errant hits by Bethel helped NHS build an early lead. After the Wildcats closed to within a point at 6-5, Kroha’s kill and a Kelly service ace gave the Hawks a little bit of breathing room. The game went back and forth with NHS holding a fairly comfortable lead. Lauren Frazzetta had a booming hit the Wildcats couldn’t handle for a 14-8 advantage, and the match ended when a Bethel hit went out of bounds for the last point.

Newtown, in its previous two victories, the week before, beat New Fairfield 3-0 (25-12, 25-23, and 25-19) and New Milford 3-0 (25-10, 25-16, and 25-22).

In the win over New Fairfield, Rowan had four kills, Kelly had four kills and eight digs, Escoda had four aces and nine digs, Dandrea compiled nine assists, three kills, and seven digs, Steimle had four aces, four kills, and two blocks, and Mackenzie Lapp added four kills and four digs.

Against New Milford, Cassie Ekstrom had six kills and four digs, Frazzetta had seven kills, Steimle also had seven kills, to go along with a trio of aces and four digs, Logan racked up 15 assists, six digs, and a pair of aces, Post contributed five aces and three kills, and Kayla O’Grady had four kills.

The Hawks were scheduled to take on four-win Stratford in their last SWC battle of the campaign, on Wednesday (after The Bee sports section went to press). They’ll close out the regular season with a tough opponent, East Lyme, on Friday, October 26 (home at 6 pm).