Joey Payeur
For a match in which both teams already knew they would live to play another day, the Muskies and Dryden Eagles played like their lives depended on it.
The Eagles retained their seemingly endless hold on the NorWOSSA senior boys’ volleyball crown by prevailing 3-2 (25-20, 25-19, 24-26. 23-25, and 15-8) in the league final Friday in Kenora.
“The second half of the match was more the way I thought the whole match would go,” Muskie coach Kirsten Talsma said about her team rallying from a 2-0 deficit.
“They didn’t quit.
“In the third set, I don’t know what it was that caused the turnaround—maybe their determination,” she noted.
The good news for the Muskies is their season will continue after Fort High used its first-place finish with a 7-1 record, and its automatic berth in the NorWOSSA final, to full advantage.
With Dryden hosting the OFSAA ‘AA’ boys’ championship this year, thus having an automatic berth in the tournament, the blueprint was in place for either the NorWOSSA champion (if not Dryden) or the runner-up (if the Eagles did win) to advance to the best-of-three NWOSSAA final for the right to go to OFSAA.
Once the Eagles conquered the Kenora Broncos in Friday’s semi-final, that assured the Muskies the NWOSSAA berth and the right to host the St. Ignatius Falcons (Thunder Bay).
The Falcons, ranked No. 1 entering the playoffs, won the SSSAA crown Monday night with a 3-1 victory (13-25, 25-14, 26-24, and 25-18) against the third-ranked Superior Gryphons to finish a 15-2 season in their conference.
Game 1 of the NWOSSAA final is set for Friday at 2 p.m. at Fort High, followed by Game 2 at 7 p.m.
Game 3, if necessary, will take place Saturday at 10 a.m.
Muskie captain Derek Kaemingh was a frowning anomaly among the mostly smiling group of Muskies who knew they had given Dryden all it could handle Friday.
That’s because the senior who returned for his “victory lap” year has been on the wrong end of the scoreboard against the Eagles more often than he cares to think about.
But Kaemingh said the team’s focus is squarely on their task at hand this weekend.
“After a tough loss, it’s good in a way to get to come right back out and go for a win,” reasoned the Muskies’ starting setter.
“This is our first chance to get to OFSAA,” he added.
“We’ll have the home court, which will hopefully will help us, although it will be different playing in the big gym.”
Dryden, with former Muskie star Allison Hyatt serving as a co-coach on the bench, broke an 18-18 tie in the first set and won seven of the set’s final nine points to grab the lead in the match.
Then they went up 2-0 in the match—using defence to force Fort High into several wide or long kill attempts, then winning the set when Kaemingh’s wayward serve landed out.
The Muskies looked reinvigorated to start the third set, with Connor Bujold rising up to pound down several emphatic kills.
Fort High led by as many as seven points, but gave it all back to create an 18-18 tie.
The teams then went back-and-forth until 24-24, creating the need for someone to win by two points.
The Muskies obliged with a bomb of a kill by Thunder White to make it 25-24, then watched the Eagles’ set the ball into the net to extend the match to another set.
In the fourth, the teams took turns building leads and then giving them back, leading to a 21-21 tie.
The Muskies took the next three points, gave back two, then watched Henry Geyshick slam home a kill to tie the match at 2-2 and force the fifth-and-deciding set.
Dryden jumped ahead 4-0 in the final set, the watched Fort High pull to within 5-4 before going on a 10-4 run to seal the match, with a kill by Bujold landing beyond the back line for the game-winning point.
The consequences of such a hard-fought match vividly was portrayed after the trophy presentation for one player in particular.
Dryden’s Justin Jordens, who missed all but the first match of the year with a back injury, came back just so he could play in the playoffs.
But the punishment his body took in such an intense final left him almost passed out with pain from re-aggravating the back injury.
He had to be carried first to the bleachers, where he lay in agony for about 10 minutes, and then to the locker-room by teammates.
The Muskies, who played in Kenora without Matt Berube (injured), plan to be the ones dishing out the pain come this weekend.
“That final should give us momentum,” said Talsma.
“The guys know the stakes,” she added. “It’s do-or-die.
“You’ve got to execute your game,” she stressed.
