WAYNE — After two rounds of the State volleyball playoffs, only one TODAY area team is still alive and perhaps surprisingly, it’s Passaic Valley. The 12th seeded Hornets swept Wayne Hills, 25-19, 25-22 in a second-round match on Thursday, two days after they had easily defeated East Orange (13-13) also in two games, 25-16, 25-16.
The Hornets were led in that match by senior Colin McNeil’s 12 kills and Alan Bronkowski’s 23 assists and five digs.
The Patriots (18-5), who suffered a disappointing end to their season, were seeded fifth in the North bracket and had defeated crosstown rival Wayne Valley, 26-24, 25-19, in a regular-season match on Wednesday for the second time this year, while enjoying a first-round bye in the State tournament.
The Indians, meanwhile, also saw their season end on Thursday, falling 25-14, 25-17 to Don Bosco. Jim Lambridis again led Valley in kills with six after having 12 the previous night against Hills. George Hionides followed his 21-assist performance against the Patriots with 13 against Bosco. D.J. Mulvihill had three digs on Wednesday and seven against Bosco on Thursday.
Passaic Valley will travel to Don Bosco tomorrow to face the 5th-seeded Ironmen in a quarterfinal match.
At Wayne Hills last Thursday, the Hornets got off to early leads in both games and Hills could not recover. Late in the opening game, the Patriots used a three-point run to close to within 21-16, but could come no closer before McNeil closed it out with a kill.
The second game was more of the same with PV taking the early advantage at 7-3 after a series of unforced errors by Hills. The margin grew to as much as nine at 18-9 before the Patriots rallied. They got to within four at 19-15 on a 6-1 run powered by a pair of kills by senior Joe Daibes and Augie Roma’s service ace. After an exchange of the next several points, the Patriots trimmed a four-point deficit to just two at 24-22 on a pair of Hornet hitting errors and a block by Roma and junior Mike Daniel.
PV claimed the match when a hit down the line by the Patriots landed just wide. As the Hornets celebrated their win, a look of disbelief was apparent on the faces of some of the Hills players. McNeil and Bronkowski again led with 20 kills and 20 assists respectively, while Nick Hrehovcik recorded seven digs.
"Colin has been a rock for us," said PV co-coach Bill Robertson. "He has been our go-to guy for two years. When you have a guy of that caliber, you go to him until someone stops him."
"PV served very well and we did not pass well," said Hills head coach Bill Eustice. "Pedro Crespo (21 assists) was running all over on serve receive, indicating that our pass wasn’t very good. Our hitters got over anxious, getting the ball behind their heads so they didn’t see the block so they either hit into the block or hit too high over it.
"Our guys came in confident and legitimately felt they’d win today. The execution just wasn’t there. A couple of times it looked like a "wow, is this really happening" kind of look, but then they snapped it back together because they know they’ve been in this situation before and knew they could do this. We just ran out of points. They have such a strong sense of what they can accomplish that the thought of losing never entered their minds. The finality of it really did slap them."
