Sunday, November 22, 2009
Chargers fall in final to Gate City
Bath County, winners of 24 straight, loses the final game 15-10 after taking a 9-8 lead.
Photos by CLEMENT BRITT Special to The Roanoke Times
Bath County's Carey Trimble (23) gets a shot past Gate City defenders during the VHSL Group A championship game at the Siegel Center. Trimble finished with 14 kills in the loss.
Bath County's Amanda Shifflett (left) and Hillary Jessee (right) attempt to block a Gate City shot during the Group A volleyball final.
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RICHMOND -- Bath County's magic carpet ride met some anticipated turbulence at the Siegel Center on Saturday in the form of defending Group A champion Gate City.
Playing inspired volleyball in a two-hour test, the upstart Chargers extended the Blue Devils to the limit before bowing 21-25, 28-26, 23-25, 25-17, 15-10.
"No one expected us to win ... but we sure didn't make it easy on them," Bath County coach Dave McGee said.
Bath County (25-2) had won 24 straight games entering the final.
The only previous loss was in the second game of the season to Group AAA Centreville.
Gate City closed with a 25-1 record, the lone setback coming to Sullivan Central near Kingsport, Tenn.
Coach Amy Reed's Blue Devils are clearly the creme de la creme of Group A volleyball, having won four of the last six state crowns.
Gate City prevailed in 2004, 2005 and 2008, leading into this fall. Also, the Devils were the state runner-up on 2006 and 2007.
Despite one of Virginia's smallest public-school enrollments, Bath County never backpedaled in a match that started at 9:30 a.m.
A chartered bus left Hot Springs well before daylight to make it to downtown Richmond for the first serve.
Some of the Chargers' fans were football players who had won a Region C Division 1 playoff game Friday night over Eastern Montgomery.
The VHSL started its tripleheader of state volleyball finals earlier than usual because of VCU's men's basketball game against Oklahoma set for 7:30 Saturday night at Siegel.
"Our game plan was get up, eat breakfast ... and kick butt," said McGee, noting the girls had "a couple of muffins" at their hotel's continental buffet.
"We really looked forward to this game because we hadn't been challenged ... we didn't know how good we were coming into this today."
After winning the first game, 25-21, the Chargers were in position to take command of the match in Game 2. Twice, they served for game-point, only to come up empty.
"We definitely stepped up," McGee said. "I just wish we could have played another team of Gate City's caliber before this one.
"We're not used to seeing teams like that in our district. We're used to seeing a much slower offense."
Senior Hillary Jessee, the Region C player of year, accumulated 18 kills and 19 digs. Carey Trimble added 14 kills, while setter Ashley Rice distributed more than 40 assists.
Amanda Shifflett served five aces and Amelia Walters was credited with 16 digs in the see-saw tussle.
Bath led 9-8 in the first-to-15 fifth game before Gate City spurted to victory.
"We're proud of what we've done," Jessee said. "We'll be known as the first team in the history of our school to get this far."
The postgame medals were handed out by three-time U.S. volleyball Olympian Stacy Sykora.
