Completing one undefeated season is tough on its own.
On Wednesday night, Salpointe Catholic’s beach volleyball team will try to make it two in a row.
To do so, the Lancers’ girls will have to take down another undefeated team. The top-seeded Lancers (17-0) will square off against No. 2 Flagstaff (16-0) in the Division II state championship match at Queen Creek Casteel High School. The match is scheduled to start at 6 p.m.
So far, Salpointe has beaten Canyon del Oro, Gilbert Christian and Gilbert Mesquite in the playoffs. The Lancers took down Mesquite 4-1 on Monday night to clinch a spot in the championship.
“We’ve been thinking about it since last year, honestly,” Salpointe coach Heather Moore-Martin said. “They’re hungry for it.”
The Lancers went 15-0 a season ago and won the program’s first-ever beach volleyball title by beating Valley Christian. A back-to-back championship run would be significant for not only Salpointe Catholic but the rest of Southern Arizona’s high school beach volleyball as well.
Just seven schools across Tucson field a beach volleyball team, though the sport is gaining traction.
“Winning would be sweet because I feel like we here in Tucson have really done a good job of pioneering volleyball in terms of getting other schools on board,” Moore-Martin said. “It’s growing and just creating some longevity for beach volleyball.”
Salpointe has stormed into the finals with just two seniors. Jaylnn Ransom and Emma Hugeback form the team’s top pairing on the sand and were part of last year’s title winning squad.
The second pairing consists of sophomore Sophia Hernandez and junior Francesca Pieroni, who Moore-Martin described as “a super-physical pairing that teams know they need to bring it to beat them.”
Junior Rylen Bourguet and sophomore Megan Muehlebach clinched the team’s trip to the state championship Monday by beating Mesquite’s third pairing.
“There was no looking back from them; they just took it home,” Moore-Martin said.
Junior Gabriella Monge and sophomore Scarlett Isaacson, followed by juniors Jordan Faircloth and Alyssa Robles round out the pairings the Lancers have used to win 17 straight matches — many of which have come in convincing fashion. The team has only lost more than one set just once this season.
“We’re an experienced team because we have had people that played on the team last year,” Moore-Martin said.
The challenge of Wednesday’s title match is that Flagstaff’s strengths and weaknesses are relatively unknown to the Lancers. The two schools didn’t meet in the regular season and don’t have a shared opponent, making scouting a difficulty.
Both schools played their semifinal matches at the same time at Casteel, however, so Moore-Martin was able to see a few brief moments of their opponent.
“Flagstaff, they’re literally a mystery team,” the Lancers’ coach said. “They look like they play a similar style as us.”
But she isn’t worried about that factoring into her team’s quest to repeat.
“I just want us to go out there and play our game of volleyball,” Moore-Martin said. “It’s very little about them and so much about what we need to do.”
