Only one team in western Massachusetts girls volleyball displays a zero in the loss column.
Amherst Regional earned the top seed in the Division 2 Western Massachusetts Tournament when the playoff brackets were announced Tuesday.
The Hurricanes (20-0) clinched a perfect regular season with a 3-0 win over Agawam on Monday.
They’ve only lost two sets this season and managed to fight off complacency as well as kill attempts.
“It kind of puts that target on our back because everyone’s trying to beat us,” Amherst senior Megan Rice said. “We just need to keep working hard in practice and be the best team we can be.”
Amherst knows its going to get a team’s best shot in every game and has answered every challenge so far.
“We’re trying to dodge the bullets, we’re trying to dodge everything, so it helps to keep us on our toes and make sure we’re not letting up because we’re ahead,” Amherst junior Teya Nolan said.
The Hurricanes received a bye in the 14-team tournament. They’ll play either No. 8 West Springfield (8-10) or No. 9 Chicopee (11-7) at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday in Amherst.
The game will not be played at Amherst Middle School, where the Hurricanes have played all season after water damaged the Amherst Regional gym in the summer.
The MIAA deemed the middle school gym an “unacceptable site for a tournament game,” according to Amherst athletic director Rich Ferro. Options are being explored, but a site has yet to be determined.
Amherst swept West Springfield to open the season and has not played Chicopee.
“They’re completely locked in. It’s been a joy all season,” Amherst coach Kacey Schmitt said. “They have laser focus every game, and they are so together as a group that they just feed off each other. It’s a real pleasure for a coach.”
Belchertown (16-4) qualified as the fifth seed and will host No. 12 Taconic (7-11) at 6:30 p.m. Thursday.
The Orioles won nine out of 10 matches to close the regular season. Their one loss was a five-set defeat against Ludlow (15-5) on Oct. 21.
That match may have pushed the Lions past Belchertown to the fourth seed.
Ludlow finished with 108.97 points in the postseason seeding scoring system, while Belchertown had 108.68.
“We were hoping for the four, but we knew it would be tight with Ludlow,” Belchertown coach Scott Poulin said. “We’ve finally got our lineup sorted out. We’re starting to fire on a lot more cylinders offensively.”
The path to the Division 3 title has run through South Deerfield for more than a decade.
Frontier Regional (7-13) qualified on Monday for a chance at a 12th straight sectional title. The Red Hawks are the sixth seed and will play No. 11 Mohawk (9-8) at 3 p.m. Saturday.
“I actually thought our strength of schedule may have bumped us up one or two seeds,” Frontier coach Sean MacDonald said. “You have to beat everybody anyway. We’re happy to have the home game.”
Lee (17-2), which lost to Frontier in last year’s title game, is the top seed. This season, the Wildcats dropped the first two sets to the Red Hawks on Oct. 12, but rallied for the five-set win in Lee.
That was one of only two games the Red Hawks played against Division 3 opponents.
“The only downside is I don’t know much about our Division 3 opponents,” MacDonald said.
The Red Hawks closed the regular season with a win over Southwick that qualified them for the tournament, which followed a 3-1 loss to Agawam and a 3-2 win over Minnechaug, the second and third seeds in Division 2.
“We’re more confident with ourselves and the system,” MacDonald said. “We’re smoothing things out.”
South Hadley (14-4) checks in on the No. 4 line. The Tigers received a bye in the first round and will host No. 5 Lenox (15-3) at 5 p.m. Saturday.
“I wasn’t quite sure (where we’d end up). There’s a couple of wild card teams I wasn’t sure where they were going to land because of their strength of schedule,” South Hadley coach Cory Koske said. “Normally it’s Frontier being heads and shoulders above everybody, and everybody else is fighting for second place.”
The Tigers played in a league composed largely of Division 2 teams in the regular season. They went 0-against Belchetown, but swept Chicopee, which both qualified.
“We had a pretty tough schedule at the end of our regular season,” Koske said.