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It’s about how the coin turned. And this season, the flip just didn’t go the way most in the Wyoming Valley Conference would have liked.
As the District 2 Class 2A playoffs begin Wednesday, it will turn into a collision course between the top half of the conference as four WVC teams descend upon Holy Redeemer for a quarterfinal doubleheader. Nanticoke and Berwick square off at 5 p.m. in a rematch of a five-set thriller earlier this season, while the host Royals take on dangerous No. 7 seed Crestwood in the nightcap.
The other half of the bracket will play at Blue Ridge High School and includes Mountain View, Abington Heights and North Pocono.
“You really can’t afford to look ahead,” Nanticoke coach Debbie Gavin said. “All you can do is focus on the match in front of you, and for us, that’s Berwick.”
Yet, the sour taste of a coin flip is still lingering around.
Redeemer, state-ranked in 2A and undefeated in the WVC without dropping a set, is the No. 2 seed.
Blue Ridge, undefeated in the Lackawanna League, won the flip and will earn the right to host both the quarterfinals and semifinals if the Raiders continue to win. It wasn’t easy for Blue Ridge, though, as the Raiders were pushed five sets twice by Mountain View and once by Abington Heights.
“It’s tough when you lose the top spot by a coin flip,” Redeemer coach Jack Kablick said. “I wish we could have played it off over the weekend or maybe we should look at a power-ranking system. There’s no doubt that we are going through a tough road with all the Wyoming Valley Conference teams. But you can’t dwell on it. It’s done. We briefly addressed it in practice. We said we lost the coin flip, and we’ll open up with Crestwood. And it was back to practice.”
If there is one team that might feel the crunch of the coin flip, it’s Crestwood.
Mike Williams’ squad has put together a six-match win streak since the Comets’ last loss on April 11. The team finished tied with Nanticoke, but lost the tiebreaker, which was a head-to-head setback against the Trojans.
Instead of making the road trip to Susquehanna County for a more-favorable matchup with Blue Ridge, Crestwood will make a brief trek to Redeemer where it will try to avenge a 3-0 loss (25-9, 25-8, 25-16) on April 3.
In the other quarterfinal, Nanticoke gets another crack at the upstart Berwick Bulldogs, the real surprise team of the WVC in 2017.
Sarah Warner’s Bulldogs, whose only league losses were to Redeemer and Delaware Valley, will be pushed by Gavin’s Trojans.
In their league matchup, Nanticoke built a 2-0 lead only to see Berwick rally for wins in the final three sets, paced by a combined 34 kills from Gabe Oliver and Dylan Michael.
“I’m happy that we get another shot at Berwick because that was a tough loss for our team,” Gavin said. “Give them credit because they never hung their heads and found a way to win, even though they lost the first two sets. I’m just hoping that we can get back to playing the way we did against Wyoming Valley West.”
Speaking of Valley West, the Spartans qualified as the No. 10 seed in the Districts 2-11 Class 3A subregional that begins Thursday. WVW faces off with No. 7 Northampton at Whitehall, starting at 5:30 p.m. Should they win, the Spartans would then face off with No. 2 seed Whitehall at 7 p.m.
The top seed in the subregional is state-ranked Emmaus. DelVal, runner-up in the WVC, drew the No. 4 spot and faces off with Nazareth.
