Pick a comeback, any comeback — and when it’s all said and done, Notre Dame-Belmont may just have a full deck of comebacks to choose from.
Entering into Thursday night’s West Bay Athletic League showdown with defending two-time champion Menlo School, NDB had already enjoyed one massive comeback win last week, rebounding from two sets down to beat the top-ranked team in the Central Coast Section, St. Francis-Mountain View. And, in the scheme of the Tigers’ overall season, they responded to a four-match losing streak by with their best winning streak of the young season.
Thursday at Moore Pavilion, NDB (3-0 WBAL Foothill Division, 8-5 overall) ran that winning streak to four straight wins with an inspired comeback, bouncing back from a 7-2 deficit in the fifth set to take down Menlo 21-25, 27-25, 25-13, 13-25, 15-11.
“We’ve had a history this year of kind of being in a slump,” NDB senior Kate Rose Keighran said. “But, after the St. Francis win, we really learned how to come together and get our chemistry working together. … We really lifted each other up, gave each other support, and that’s how we fought through.”
Keighran was one of four NDB hitters to score double-digit kills. The senior outside hitter put down a career-high 13 kills, and junior middle Kelly Schackel scored a team-high 16.
Junior opposite Shea Hanson joined the party with her 10th kill with a long coffin-corner cross off the right side to give NDB a 13-10 lead in Game 5. Moments later, Miller scored match point off the right side, her 11th kill of the night.
“We knew we were going to be up against some really big hitters, and we were prepared for that,” Menlo sophomore Hanna Hoffman said. “But I thought we did a good job of shutting it down and working on our defense. Of course, they did get some really good kills, especially [Schackel] in the middle. It’s really hard to stop her.”
Schackel was blasting through the middle most of the night, but it was the infusion of Miller that changed the complexion of the match. The Tigers’ leading scorer — averaging 3.9 kills per set this season — didn’t score a single kill in Game 1, as Menlo leveraged a 10-10 tie with a five-point run, while pinning Miller in the back row.
It wasn’t until Game 2 that Miller found the floor for her first match kill, tooling the block off the left side to close a Menlo lead to 9-8. Then later in the set, Hanson found the hot hand, scoring off the left side to force set point at 24-22, then again in extra-points by hitting a right-side cross on a back set from Lauren Payne — one of three setters utilized by NDB this season — to make it 26-25.
Then Keighran finished off Game 2 with a block to tie it 1 set apiece.
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“We have been mixing up our rotations a lot, trying to see what works and what doesn’t,” Keighran said. “We have a bunch of different setters. And sometimes at practice, it’s hard to get enough reps with each setters, which can be hard, especially when it comes to game time … and sometimes it can be hard to start the gelling on the court.”
NDB seemed to hit stride in Game 3, going on an early 8-1 run — and outshooting Menlo 14-3 in team kills in the set — to coast to a 2 sets to 1 lead. But Menlo returned the favor, opening Game 4 with a 9-1 run and ultimately forcing a Game 5 showdown.
The Tigers came out in the fifth set playing magnificent defense, as Keighran and senior libero Delaney Walsh were picking up nearly everything. Still, Menlo was outlasting them, getting key back-to-back kills from senior outside hitter Emma Holland before a blast through the middle by sophomore Sharon Nejad gave the Lady Knights a 7-2 advantage.
“You’ve just got to stay in it,” NDB head coach Jen Agresti said. “It’s volleyball … and how you’re going to outsmart each other. Sometimes we get into this swinging-as-hard-as-you-can game. And the game is really mixing up your shots and finding the smart set. So, I thought we did a good job of that in the final set there.”
Then NDB turned the lights out — literally — as the lights at Moore Pavilion blacked out between points for half a minute in the midst of a 6-1 run by the Tigers. Menlo junior Roxy Karrer responded to the blackout with her match-high 16th kill. But Miller responded by roasting a kill off the right side to force a side-out, and NDB sophomore Emma Baumgarten went on a four-point run, including two aces, to swing the Tigers to a 9-8 lead.
Schackel gave NDB the lead for good at 10-9 with a fireball off middle.
“Honestly, the kids just played clean volleyball the way we need to play,” Agresti said. “Of course, Abby coming around to the front row at the end was a good thing for us.”
Menlo (0-2, 9-6), after starting the season winning nine of its first 11 matches, has now lost four in a row. Those losses have come to some tough customers, though: St. Francis, Sacred Heart Prep and Gunn.
“Unfortunately, it has been our fourth loss in a row,” Hoffman said. “We’re trying to work things out. And, unfortunately, the last two games against Sacred Heart and Gunn, we did not come out our strongest. So, we’re still trying to build our way up from that and, actually, I thought we played really well and gave a really good fight. It was a totally different game than when we played against Sacred Heart and against Gunn. … We’re progressing, for sure. We still need to go over the edge a little bit but we’re working our way back up.”
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