Cincinnati owns the Division I state volleyball final this year. Seton and St. Ursula Academy both won their state semifinals on Thursday, Nov. 12, setting up an all-Girls Greater Catholic League championship match at noon on Friday, Nov. 13 — the first all-GGCL state final since 2007, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer.
Seton stormed into its third straight state title match with a sweep of Olentangy Liberty, 25-11, 25-17, 25-16, at Butler High School, the Enquirer reported. Charley Moeddel’s 16th and 17th kills completed the sweep, Penelope Reisman finished with 34 assists, five digs and three kills, and the Saints (27-0) held Liberty to a .031 hitting percentage for the match.
St. Ursula had the harder road. The Bulldogs (19-8) lost the first set of a match for the first time all year, falling 25-13 to Cleveland St. Joseph Academy, then rallied to win 13-25, 25-10, 25-13, 25-19 and reach their second state championship match in three years, according to the Enquirer. Lola Waleskowski led St. Ursula with 22 kills on a .439 hitting percentage, Lucy Waleskowski finished with 39 assists and a team-high 13 digs, and Parker Terrill added 13 kills.
The final is a rubber match with history on both sides. Seton won both regular-season meetings between the schools, but St. Ursula was the first team to take a set off the Saints this season, on Sept. 24, according to the Enquirer. “That was the goal from the very beginning of the season,” St. Ursula head coach Gretchen Krumdieck told the Cincinnati Enquirer. “It’s awesome and it just shows how strong we are as a city and the talent, not just in Division I.”
Seton head coach Kelly Crowley credited her team’s relentless point-by-point play after the semifinal. “We want to be a team that wins 70 percent of what we call 50-50 points. We won the dig battle. We won the block battle. We won the kill battle. You’re going to win a lot of matches that way,” Crowley told the Cincinnati Enquirer.
Friday’s final tips off at noon. One of the two Cincinnati programs will leave with a state championship, and the GGCL — already represented across the divisions, with Fenwick playing for the Division IV title at 4 p.m. Friday — will add another trophy to a tournament weekend that has underlined Cincinnati’s depth in girls volleyball.
Photo: K.M. Klemencic, CC BY