Reporter for The Canyon Weekly
The Santiam High volleyball squad is on a historic run. The Wolverines took out Clatskanie in three sets on Saturday, Oct. 28, before a loud and appreciative home crowd to advance to this weekend’s Class 2A state tournament in Redmond.
Santiam, seeded No. 8 in the bracket, improved to 17-8 and will take on No. 1 Western Christian at 8 a.m. Friday, Nov. 3 in the quarterfinals.
Santiam last played in the round of 16 in 2013, when as the No. 16 seed the Wolverines fell to No. 1 Weston-McEwen one match short of state. In 2002, when the final site bracket contained 16 teams, the Wolverines were eliminated during pool play and did not participate in the final eight.
“It took a lot of preparation and the girls have been working very hard,” Santiam coach Alicia Boyd told The Canyon Weekly after the Clatskanie match. “We knew Cloataskanie was going to come out swinging. But our front row did a good job defending the net. Clatskanie had some great hitters but because of our blocking we were able to shut them down.”
Santiam won the match 25-23, 25-16 and 25-20. The Wolverines pulled away from a 22-22 tie late in set one, led by a block and a dink from senior MaKayla Dodge. Santiam led comfortably for most of the second set and took it from 17-13 to 22-13 while Kasey Solus was serving for the Wolverines. Solus, who did a good job varying her service location and pace, scored a pair of aces during the run.
Santiam had to come from behind in the third set. The visiting Tigers led 5-0 early and still led 12-10 midway through the set, but the Wolverines scored 4 points in row, three on aces by Madison Allen, to take a 14-12 lead. The Tigers, led by some heavy hitting by Natalie Baker, eventually tied the match 18-18, but a block by Solus, three kills by MaKayla Dodge and a kill by Averie Peterson helped the hosts pull away.
“It wasn’t our best performance,” Boyd said. “They put a lot of pressure on themselves because they knew they had to win to move forward to the final eight. They will learn from this game, and I will prepare them the best I can for the quarterfinals in Redmond.”
Maizy Downey set up the team’s big hitters with 21 assists. Makayla Dodge totaled nine kills and Solus six blocks. Solus and Allen both had three aces.
The squad is fairly young. Among the starting group MaKayla Dodge, McKenna Dodge and Solus are the lone seniors. Downey is a sophomore and Peterson, Brooklyn Massey, Allen and libero Boston Flores are all juniors.
“I knew this squad would be a state contender last year,” Boyd said. “In fact, I purchased custom shoes during the pre-season with ‘Coach Boyd’ on them with a golden swish. I told them this is the golden year and we were going to state. That has been our goal, we did it and we still have a lot of fight left in us. The girls are very capable, they just need to believe in themselves and play their game.”
Western Christian is 24-2 and defeated Santiam by 3-0 counts on Oct. 2 and Oct. 4 in Tri-River Conference matches. The winner of Friday morning’s quarterfinal advances to a 6:30 p.m. semifinal that night against No. 5 Grant Union of John Day or No. 4 Salem Academy, another Tri-River entrant. The final is at 6 p.m. Saturday. All matches are at Ridgeview High.
Scio, meanwhile, also advanced to the playoffs, but the Loggers fell in the second round in Class 3A to Corbett in a hard-fought 4-setter, 25-17, 25-19, 25-22 and 26-24. Scio finished 17-8 overall after taking third in the PacWest Conference behind Santiam Christian and Dayton.
FOOTBALL: Scio is the 12th seed in the Class 3A bracket and visits No. 5 Lakeview on Saturday, Nov. 4, at 1 p.m. The Loggers finished the regular season 7-2 overall and 5-2 in Special District 2 after a 50–0 win at Jefferson on Oct. 27. Scio’s lone losses were to No. 3 Dayton and No. 10 Santiam Christian, both of whom are on the other side of the 16-team bracket.The Scio-Lakeview winner takes on South Umpqua or Kennedy in the quarterfinals.
CROSS COUNTRY: Santiam and Scio participated in district cross country meets on Oct. 26 at Cheadle Lake Park in Lebanon. All races were conducted over 5,000 meters.
Tico Irving of Santiam was the top individual finisher, taking 26th in the Class 2A-1A boys competition in 19:28.60. Teammates Eli Stave (83rd, 25:08.70) and Jesse Moreno (26:02.80) also participated.
The Scio boys, meanwhile, took sixth as a team in the Class 3A meet. Leading the way was Syrus Diaz, who took 29th in 20:05.23.Also running for the Loggers were Chris Ennis (31st, 20:28.98), Max Zedwick (38th), 22:19.10), Jack Forson (39th, 22:21.41), Riley Utter (40th, 22:53.52) and Keltes James (42nd, 24:00.56).
In addition, Maggie Sisk of Santiam took 35th in the 3A-2A-1A girls meet in 23:58.20, while Emily Zamudio of Scio was 47th in 25:26.34.
Charlie Zedwick of Scio took 13th in the boys 3A JV competition in 26:59.87, while teammate Isaac Emmons was 17th in 31:45.60.
