by Ed Shepherd
Sports Correspondent

West Seattle fought a good fight but surrendered in battle to Chief Sealth, in three, competitive sets, marking a 25-23, 25-22, 25-20, match sweep for the Seahawks on the Wildcats' gym floor in Metro 'Valley' League action Monday Oct. 20.

Chief Sealth improved to a 5-2 record while West Seattle dropped to 4-3 in league. One more game for both these teams on Wednesday before a seeding game on Thursday propels them into Saturday's Metro League Tournament, with 16 teams in the three divisions, Valley, Sound, Mountain, competing for spots into the following weekend's district tournament.

"Always tough when we play West Seattle," said Seahawks coach, Lorna Considine. "Especially when coming on their last home game and seniors night. You never know what is going to happen. They definitely never gave up."

Never.

It was a three-set sweep of games for the Seahawks, but the Wildcats were in every single game, losing by no more than five points in any of the three miniature battles, if one wants to think about the finer details of why this match wasn't over until it was over, even with the word 'sweep' in there.

It was a war.

Forget the final scores of games as Chief Sealth led 23-16 in the first game's set before Wildcats' senior, Julia Nark served strongly for four straight points, making it a 23-20 score. Then, a Seahawks server served the ball out of bounds and that cut the visitor's led to 23-21. Then, a kill by the Seahawks senior, Jacqueline Andrade, and, that really put the pressure on the Wildcats, trailing, then, 24-21.

But, speaking of not giving up, as Seahawks coach, Considine stated a trait the Wildcats exemplified, it was junior, Lexi Iaone's spike for a point that cut the Seahawks lead to 24-22.

So, still, game point at stake, and, the Seahawks' best server, Andrade served a hard shot, close, to the back line but out of bounds, making it really close in game one, 24-23, Seahawks.

But, Andrade did it again, as she recorded five kills in the first set alone for her Seahawks team, pounding down a kill for the win.

'She calms it down," said Considine. "She's a senior. I have six seniors."

The seniors really did lead for the Seahawks in this one, being the main point makers and also the ones setting up the action, too, with bumps and sets and digs, the whole gamut.

But, the Wildcats were definitely not done after the first set, digging in themselves to really root into the feathers of the foe, taking a lead, 6-3 early in that one, moving it to 20-16 in the latter stages, on a momentum play where the Seahawks' Lorna Sailiai jumped high and windmilled the ball over the net, fiercely, but the straight-up, leaping pairs of hands from Iaone and teammate, Alexus Peterson, blocked the ball right back into the Seahawks side of the net.

"It was a good fight, seniors night," said Iaone, who recorded nine kills in the game.

But, the Seahawks would not grow weary in this game two, fighting all the more harder, with libero, sophomore, Reanne Tegman, getting a nice dig that translated to a big point when the Wildcats could not field the hit back at the foe, so, 20-17. Then, the next point went the Seahawks way, too, with sophomore, Sidney Lemer, smashing a kill, making it 20-18, even as the ball grazed and went by the blocking brigade of 6-1 Wildcats junior, Lydia Giomi, and, 5-9 Peterson, up at the net.

A comeback was a-coming for the Seahawks.

The Wildcats, first, extended it's lead to 21-18, with a kill by Giomi. But, the relentless diving in for points by the Seahawks continued in this crucial game two that would either tie things up, and , make it a 'new' game, or, give the Seahawks a huge lead, with only one game remaining for them to decide things and the Wildcats needing all three to come back.

The Seahawks came back to make it 21-19 on a Sailiai kill and then Olivia Body, a senior, would not be denied, spiking a ball through a block, for a kill, cutting the Wildcats lead to a mere one point, 21-20. On the Wildcats next serve, it was out of bounds, so, 21-21. And, the Seahawks made it 23-21 , with consecutive kills from the teams' kill leader for this game and this season, Andrade.

Wildcats' coach, Joe Baleto, took a time-out to try and get his girls to gather themselves and still swoop in for a victory in game two, but, the preceding points went to the Seahawks for a 25-22 win, as the momentum for the Wildcats, and, the game, was lost.

"We let them back in it," said Baleto. "We gave them a lot of points. Definitely can't do that in matches like this."
Considine, despite his girls getting behind by as many as five points late in this game two, did not give in to trying to settle the girls down via a time-out. She wanted them to do things different than that in a tough situation.
"I tend to not take time-outs because they have to learn how to pull it out together as a team," said Considine.
And, that's exactly what these Seahawks young ladies did in game two.
"They pulled it together out on the court, worked as a team, started to move on defense, and, get each other involved in the play," said Considine.

Game three was the farthest apart of the three scores but it was still 25-20 and, in what turned out to be the final game of the sets, the Seahawks led 10-7 and stretched the lead to 18-10 and 19-10 and 22-11 and 22-15. At this point, the Wildcats came back with Iaone doing a second-of-the-match, nice, deceptive, quick tap-over of the ball for a point, 22-16. And, Giomi registered another kill, she had eight for the match. And, another Knowles kill came and she, too, was busy that way, getting seven for the night, so, it was 22-17.
But, the Seahawks just wore down the young lady, Wildcats, who served a ball out of bounds, bumped a long ball too far, going past the backline.

And, the victory kill for game three and, consequently, for the match went to a sophomore, Julia Stewart, for the Seahawks.

"I did one thing," said Stewart, not terribly impressed with having said that. "The winning play of the game."
And, that's always a big thing with a game like this when a match outcome is potentially in doubt if the other team gets a set win and gets on a roll.

The Wildcats' Andrade spoke for her team, and, to note, in addition to her double digit kills total, 12, and, her service winners, 10, in the three-game set, she also sported a half dozen ace serves in three games via a skillful, jump and smash service style.

"We came out excited and maintained energy throughout the match," said Andrade. "And, even though we made mistakes, we made up for them by playing our pace and we didn't let up. We got control of ourselves when we started making mistakes.

And, on the other side, Baleto noted that his team played well, at times, but, at key times, that was where it showed work is needed to close the deal.

"Have to be consistent to stay competitive," said Baleto. "And that is what we are not doing right now, giving up pivotal points a lot of times in the match."

Baleto noted some players, of many, he felt played well, including Isabella Babb, the team's libero, was one talked about, and, also, Iaone and Giomi.

"Bella had a good game," said Baleto. "Lydia had a good game, definitely a spark plug for us. Lexi had a good game. Her and Lydia are our most consistent players. And, they are only juniors, so they have another year. We definitely are going to meet them (Chief Sealth) again."

And, Iaone had words to add on to that last comment, to finish things off.

"I think, next time we play them we will be more prepared," said Iaone.