WORCESTER — Winning a state championship as a freshman just doesn’t feel the same as winning it as a senior.
Just ask Jillian Apanell and Sydney Scanlon.
Apanell and Scanlon are two of the seven seniors alongside Eve Dougan, Shelby Orloski, Brooke Davis, Sam Baker and Aniela Carey on the Frontier volleyball team, but the only two that defeated Rockland for a state championship in 2019.
Since winning the championship as freshmen, those seven seniors have been on a mission to secure another championship, but it hasn’t been easy.
When you win a state title as a freshman and you play for a program as dominant as Frontier, you expect hoisting the state title trophy will be a yearly occurrence, but it hasn’t been that simple. COVID-19 took away the 2020 tournament. Apanell hurt her knee in the state semifinals last year, and Frontier eventually lost to Paulo Freire in the finals.
This fall was their last shot. They swept Mount Greylock to claim the Division 5 championship.
“We’ve all been in this program for so long,” Scanlon said. “We’ve been working so hard. Even if all of us didn’t play, we all played a big part in this and deserved it. This one is ours, and it feels so good.”
Not many get to close out their senior year with a state championship victory, and the Redhawks are proud that they’re some of the lucky ones.
“This feels like ours a lot more,” Apanell said. “Sydney and I always said it was crazy we’re playing as freshmen but now we play a much larger role and lead the team a lot more. In 2019 we were just doing whatever we were told.”
For Apanell, the win is hard work personified. After putting in the recovery time to get ready for the volleyball season this fall, she suffered a setback that delayed her return to the court.
Getting to close things out with a championship makes all that hard work worth while.
“It’s hard to put into words because ever since we won it here my freshman year, I’ve been chasing getting back here,” Apanell said. “There’s been so many setbacks with the ACL and the meniscus. It was a lot on my mind because I had to work so hard to get back from the first injury then suffering the setback before the season, I knew I wasn’t going to be 100 percent. Winning this means so much and I’m so grateful to have the team and support around me.”
The win over the Mounties closed out Frontier’s season with a 25-1 record, its lone loss coming in five sets against Westborough, the Div. 2 state champion.
Redhawks coach Sean MacDonald has seen all the work put in by his seniors, and said he is proud of them for taking home another trophy.
“If our only blemish is losing a five set match against the Div. 2 state champs, our little school feels good about that,” MacDonald said.
He also knows it won’t be easy to replace the production lost by those seven seniors going forward. Scanlon has over 1,500 assists and would have topped 2,000 if not for the lost season.
“They’ve put in so much work and were crushed when we couldn’t play a couple years ago,” MacDonald said. “It’s a special group. We’ll miss them.”
The win also marks the 11th state championship for MacDonald, who’s in his 20th season coaching the Redhawks.
In those 20 years Frontier has made the state championship in 14 of them, something the longtime coach doesn’t take lightly.
“It means a lot to me,” MacDonald said. “I put a lot of time and effort into this. It’s a lot of work watching video, scouting opponents and finding out what they do well and don’t do well. I have a headache from the screen time. I can’t do any serves or hits but I can try to put them in the best position to do what they do.
“Some people like doing crossword puzzles but I like breaking other teams’ rotations apart,” he added. “I love the kids I work with.”