By Chris Paul
The Londonderry High School Girls’ Volleyball team finished up their regular season last week, losing only their second match of the season and winning two others.
The Lancer squad finished the season with an exceptional 16-2, finishing in third place behind the Bedford Bulldogs at 18-0 and Hollis Brookline, who also finished at 16-2, but beat Londonderry in the final week of the season.
By virtue of that stellar record, the girls will enter this year’s New Hampshire Interscholastic Athletic Association’s Division I playoffs as the number three seed and will face the Nashua South Purple Panthers in the Preliminary Round at home on Tuesday, Oct. 25 at 6 p.m.
Londonderry started the week at Salem High School where they got their 15th win of the season. It was also their fifth consecutive win and their and their tenth straight set shutout.
The Blue Devils were only able to make it close in one of the three sets with the Lancers winning 25-10, 25-17, and 26-24.
Highlights for Londonderry from the one-sided game came from three sources. Senior Sydney Rankin, who hasn’t seen much playing time due to an injury, had six assists, four aces and three digs in the match. Senior Shannon Ball had seven kills and three digs and junior Sarah DeFazio got four assists and three aces.
Two nights later, at home, the Lancers suffered just their second loss of the season with a 3-1 defeat at the hands of the squad from Hollis-Brookline High School.
The Lancers took the first set 16-25, but dropped the following 26-24, 25-16, and 25-11 to the Lady Cavaliers.
Junior Ally McGonagle had 10 digs, seven kills, and three aces in the game. Senior Madi Saucier got eight kills and two blocks; junior Abby Harrington had five digs and two aces; and Lexi Small finished with 19 assists and three kills.
The Lady Lancers bounced back with a five set win at Exeter High School, playing a very good Blue Hawks squad to finish the regular season on Friday.
After getting behind early, losing the opening sets 23-25 and 22-25. The LHS team dug deep to win the final three sets 25-22, 25-19, and 15-10.
Highlights for Londonderry came from several sources: Ally McGonagle had 16 kills, 14 digs, and three aces; Lexi Small managed 36 assists, nine digs, and four aces; senior Lacey Turner had 12 kills and 10 digs; senior Sam Fortier got seven digs and three aces; junior Abby Harrington got five digs and three aces; senior Bella Elguezabal had seven digs, four assists and two aces; and freshman Riley Campo had five blocks and four kills.