Girls volleyball: Snipes sets tone as Branson secures another section title
As the setter for the Branson School girls volleyball team, part of Logan Tusher’s job description is to figure out which of her hitters is locked in and ready to have a big game. Hours before the North Coast Section Division III title game even started, Tusher could tell that outside hitter Sadie Snipes was going to go off.
“I do think it started from the beginning of the day, not just the beginning of the match,” Tusher said. “When we all showed up at the football game to support our fans that are supporting us, she was just talking about the game and was really excited about it, ready on the get-go with our stretching routine. She was just on it and really laser focused. … She was really ready from the beginning of the day, which is awesome.”
Snipes and the top-seeded Bulls (18-10) got off to a blistering start in a comfortable three-set win at home, 25-16, 25-14, 25-16 against No. 3 University (25-6) on Saturday night. The victory secured the program’s fourth consecutive section title and the 12th since 2009.
“It feels really good,” Snipes said. ”All the teams are so good and everyone’s so competitive that nothing is a given, so it feels really good to accomplish this.”
The Bulls and a slew of other Marin teams that made it to section semifinals will learn their NorCal playoff fates when those brackets are released on Sunday. Branson, Redwood and Marin Catholic could all be bunched up based on the fact that they all defeated each other at least once this year.
Against University, the Bulls left no room for doubt. Libero Lauren Dignan used her tough serving to give the Bulls an immediate 5-0 lead in the first set.
“We spent a lot of time serving in practice because we know it’s one of our best skills when we’re doing it right,” Branson coach Michelle Brazil said. “It definitely paid off today – not just the toughness but serving the right zones and being consistent.”
Snipes had two kills during Dignan’s service run but she was just getting warmed up. Snipes picked up her seventh kill of the set as Branson took a 16-10 lead then added an ace of her own to extend the lead to 20-11.
“Sadie is a stud,” Branson’s Anna Palfy said. “I love Sadie. She really just gets after it when she’s in the front row. She’s really disciplined with her block, too. I think she had a lot of good blocks. She moves the ball around so well on the court. The other team never really knows what they are going to get with her and that’s what makes her such an awesome player.”
Snipes and University standout Kinnari Atluru matched each other kill for kill as the match progressed, tying for game-high honors with 16 apiece. Branson also got 12 kills from Elena Fisher, eight from Eva Lacy and five from Cayman Stein.
As a result, University just wasn’t able to keep pace with the Bulls. The Red Devils’ biggest lead at any time was by one point and Branson put all three sets away by the midway point – leading 18-9 in the second and 17-10 in the third.
Snipes had a trio of aces in a four-point stretch late in the second set before Stein accounted for the winner with a left-handed kill.
“I was trying to serve diagonally across the court into zone 1,” Snipes said. “When I serve zone 1, I kind of take a step outside the court so I have more room to go so I can be a little bit more aggressive and put a little more pace on the ball because there’s room to that corner.”
Fisher had a flurry of kills and a big block midway through the third set as Branson pulled away then Snipes had four late kills including the match winner.
In addition to having success at the net and behind the service line, the Bulls also played strong defense with three players racking up double-digit digs. Dignan had a game-high 24, Tusher added 12 and Fisher had 11.
“I thought we played great defense,” Brazil said. “I mean with the numbers you could see there was a number of people in double-digit digs and Lauren in particular with 24 in a three-set match – that’s kind of insane. That’s another part of our game that’s really important for us to win because sometimes it’s not necessarily like the big kills or the big block. We talk about suffocating defense – just not letting the ball hit the floor and even if they do get a kill, just getting a touch or two on it to really keep the momentum going.”