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Frontier’s Emilie Candelaria (3) rises for a hit against Lowell Catholic during the Redhawks’ 3-0 sweep in the MIAA Division 4 Round of 16 on Monday night at Goodnow Gymnasium in South Deerfield. -
Frontier’s Caroline Deane (11) rises for a hit against Lowell Catholic during the Redhawks’ 3-0 sweep in the MIAA Division 4 Round of 16 on Monday night at Goodnow Gymnasium in South Deerfield. -
Frontier’s Allie Pierce (6) serves against Lowell Catholic during the Redhawks’ 3-0 sweep in the MIAA Division 4 Round of 16 on Monday night at Goodnow Gymnasium in South Deerfield. -
Frontier’s Kate DeMaio makes a pass during a match against Lowell Catholic in the Round of 16 earlier this week in South Deerfield. -
Frontier’s Olivia Machon (21) tries to make a block against Lowell Catholic during the Redhawks’ 3-0 sweep in the MIAA Division 4 Round of 16 on Monday night at Goodnow Gymnasium in South Deerfield. -
Frontier’s Allie Pierce (6) makes a pass against Lowell Catholic during the Redhawks’ 3-0 sweep in the MIAA Division 4 Round of 16 on Monday night at Goodnow Gymnasium in South Deerfield.
SOUTH DEERFIELD — Frontier girls volleyball coach Sean MacDonald knew Lowell Catholic, the Redhawks’ opponent in the MIAA Div. 4 Round of 16, was a scrappy group that wasn’t going to allow his side to cruise into the quarterfinals.
It played out exactly that way on Monday at Goodnow Gymnasium.
The 19th-seeded Crusaders continued to hang around with the No. 3 Redhawks, digging out spikes and keeping the ball in play to stay in the match. In the end, the defending Div. 5 state champs rallied late in the opening two sets before finding a rhythm in the third to advance to the state quarters with a 3-0 sweep.
Frontier advanced to play the winner of No. 6 Joseph Case and No. 11 Millbury, which play on Tuesday.
“Always good to win,” MacDonald said. “They dug a lot of stuff we hit at them. I have some spies in the eastern part of the state who were on their schedule and they told me they weren’t overpowering offensively and they’re very scrappy and they keep the ball alive. That was a pretty accurate description of their team.”
While pleased with the win, MacDonald said there was plenty for the Redhawks (19-5) to clean up if they want to go on another championship run – this time in a higher division.
With the experience on the roster, he said his players already know what needs to be fixed to make that run.
“They know what they need to clean up,” MacDonald said. “They’ll bring them up without me having to tell them.”
Lowell Catholic (10-12) scored the opening three points in the first set. Frontier battled back and ended up taking a 15-9 lead following kills from Caroline Deane and Kate DeMaio and an ace from Emilie Candelaria.
That’s when the Crusaders went on a run in the service station to draw even. Kylee McDonough put down three aces in a row while Lowell Catholic capitalized on some Redhawk mistake to eventually tie things at 16.
MacDonald called a timeout, and Frontier regrouped. Leading 20-18, Deane smashed back-to-back kills followed by an ace from Allie Pierce. Deane tallied another kill to help the Redhawks take a 1-0 lead with a 25-21 opening-set win.
Frontier came out firing in the second set, with Gabby Adams and Deane providing kills while Olivia Machon put down an ace to give the Redhawks a 9-2 lead.
Deane tallied three more aces while Pierce had an ace and DeMaio put down a kill to give Frontier a 17-7 lead, but just as MacDonald expected, Lowell Catholic scrapped its way back to make things interesting late.
Mollie Miner got it rolling with a pair of aces for the Crusaders while the Redhawks struggled to return serves, with Lowell Catholic cutting the lead to 17-13.
Frontier didn’t let it get any closer than that, with Deane closing things out with a kill to give the Redhawks a 25-19 set win to take a 2-0 lead.
“It’s such a mental game,” MacDonald said. “You have a 10 point lead and you let them back in and now that 10 point lead is a five point lead. We had hitting errors, service errors.”
After letting Lowell Catholic hang around for two sets, Frontier wasn’t messing around in the third frame. Leading 8-6, the Redhawks went on a 15-4 run to take a 23-10 lead and eventually closed things out with a 25-14 victory.
Deane led the way with 16 kills in the win. Adams provided six kills and two aces, Machon finished with five kills and two aces, DeMaio tallied three kills, Candelaria put down five aces while Pierce recorded five aces and 30 assists in the win.
If the bracket holds and it is Joseph Case, it’ll be an opponent Frontier has plenty of familiarity with.
The Redhawks played them throughout the 2010s in the old state format, last playing in the 2016 state championship match. No matter the opponent, MacDonald and Frontier know it will need to be at its best moving forward.
“We’re going to have to play better than we did today,” MacDonald said. “We’re down to the final eight. It’ll be nice to play at home but we’re going to need to play a lot better against another good team. We’re going to have to beat three legit teams to win this thing. It’ll probably be tougher than last year.”