BY CLIFF SMELLEY
Keystone Heights High School’s volleyball team will play for the District 5-3A championship after its 3-1 (10-25, 25-19, 25-13, 25-21) win over third seed Crescent City in an Oct. 14 semifinal match in Keystone.
The second seed Indians (17-9) will travel to Newberry to play the top seed Panthers (18-8) for the championship on Thursday, Oct. 16, at 6 p.m.
After scoring just 10 points in the first set against Crescent City (15-10), the Indians took a 6-1 lead in the second set, going on a 4-0 run with Kadence Massey serving.
It was 17-12 in favor of Keystone when the Indians scored three points with Rachel Blank serving. Two of those points came off a Mia Rivera kills and Rivera tip.
A Blank kill forced side-out and gave the serve to Massey, with the Indians leading 24-19. Rivera recorded a kill for the winning point.
Keystone led 15-12 in the third set before getting two consecutive kills by Rivera with Blank serving.
The Indians ended the set on a 5-0 run with Rivera serving. She recorded two straight aces during that span, which also included a point off a Massey tip.
Keystone trailed early in the fourth set, but three points with Blank serving put the Indians up 10-8.
It was 17-14 in favor of the Indians when the Raiders scored three straight points to tie it up. A Blank tip stopped the brief run and put Keystone back ahead.
Blank and Rivera each had a kill off a Kaleigh Marquart assist to give the Indians a 21-17 lead.
Two points with Blank serving left Keystone one point away from winning the match. A Rivera kill off a Marquart assist made it 24-19, but the Raiders got a kill from Logan Bornstein to force side-out.
That proved to be Crescent City’s final point as Keystone’s Bralee-Kate Chester recorded the match-winning point on a tip.
Prior to the tournament, the Indians went 2-1 in their final three regular-season matches.
The first of those wins was by a 3-0 (25-9, 25-11, 25-8) score against visiting Hawthorne on Oct. 6. Massey and Rivera had seven and six kills, respectively. Massey added six digs and six aces, while Rivera also had nine digs.
Marquart recorded 23 assists and nine aces, while Blank had five kills
Mackenzie Castlevecchi and Kaylyn Chapman had two blocks each.
On Oct. 7, the Indians defeated visiting Interlachen 3-0 25-19, 25-10, 25-23), getting 10 kills, six aces and five digs from Massey and nine kills and six digs from Rivera.
Bella Cumbo had seven digs, while Marquart had 24 assists and five aces.
Keystone ended the regular season with a 3-0 loss to host Clay on Oct. 8.
