photo by: Andrew Grimm

John Marshall’s Paislee Babiczuk comes up with a block against Steubenville on Monday.

STEUBENVILLE — The old saying “it’s not about how you start, it how’s you finish” could be re-written to “it’s not how you play in the middle, but how finish” to more accurately describe John Marshall’s five-set triumph over Big Red on Monday night.

The Monarchs won the first set convincingly, rallied to win the second, then watched Big Red win the next two to force a fifth set. The fifth set, however, was all Monarchs as JM departed Steubenville with a 3-2 match win.

The match was a meeting of the No. 2 and No. 4 ranked teams in the OVAC Class 5A standings three days ahead of the cutoff for the tournament.

“That was a battle,” JM head coach Chelsea Eikleberry said. “We played a lot of volleyball over the weekend at a tournament at Herbert Hoover, I think our girls got a little comfortable (after getting up 2-0) but they pulled through at the end and brought the energy when we needed it.

“Props to Steubenville, they are playing some really good volleyball right now, too. They never gave up, that was an exciting game and an fun game to be a part of. I compliment them.”

JM won the opening set 25-13. The second set was much closer, though, as Big Red (11-7) had two match points leading 24-22, but the Monarchs (14-5-3) scored the final four points to take the set 26-25 and a 2-0 match lead.

Big Red, though, was not going to go away easy. After JM took an 11-7 lead in the third set looking for a sweep, Big Red rattled off a 10-1 run and took the set 25-18 to stay alive. In the fourth set, JM again went up early, this time 8-3, but Big Red again had an answer to rally back, ultimately closing on a 6-1 run to win the set 25-20, sealed by an Aubrey Slussar ace.

The roles reversed in the fifth, though, as Steubenville opened an early lead, 3-1, in the race to 15, but the Monarchs were the ones to rally with a big run this time, rattling off a 14-2 stretch to close the match with a 15-5 fifth set win.

“Our girls have a lot of grit,” Eikleberry said. “We practice a lot of the mental things, we work on the mental stuff every day and I think it showed. The girls really wanted it at the end and they brought it.”

Big Red coach Logan Colabella was happy with her team’s effort, though she wished they got off to a better start and could have finished the second set when they had a chance to.

“‘M proud of the girls, they dropped the first two and could have quit and they didn’t,” Colabella said. “They kept playing hard. The first set wasn’t us, but we adjusted. I’m not mad with how we played at all, we just needed to finish. If we finished that second set, it’s a completely different outcome. That is something we will work on, but we played great in the third and fourth and I’m proud of them.

“JM is a phenomenal team, hat’s off to them. That was the first time we’ve played them since I’ve been here. They came out strong in the fifth set, kudos to them. It was a great match and the kind of match that will make us better at tournament time.”

For Big Red, Slussar racked up 37 assists, three aces, two blocks and six digs, Emma Lyons had 14 kills, five blocks and five digs, Phynyx Fleming tallied 10 kills, Addy Snyder had eight kills and four blocks and Giuliana Cramer tallied 17 digs.

For JM, Nia Miller had two aces, a block and 16 kills, Sarah Hess had 25 assists, Sarah Naome had 12 kills, Addison Blake had 11 kills and Paislee Babiczuk recorded seven kills.

UP NEXT

John Marshall: Returns home to host University today.

Big Red: Travels to Beaver Local today.