Tigers, Kowboys play instant-classic five-set match for spot in 7A-5 final
Three Osceola County volleyball squads will play for district championships Thursday night.
While Harmony (23-25, 25-18, 25-19, 25-17 over St. Cloud) and Gateway (25-18, 25-23, 24-26, 25-23 over Lake Minneola) also won district semifinals, Tohopekaliga reached the District 7A-5 final tonight in incredibly dramatic fashion Wednesday over Osceola, a rival seeking its fifth straight district championship.
Harmony (13-9) hosts East Ridge at 6 p.m. for a District 6A-10 title match between its top two seeds. Gateway (10-9) No. 2 in 5A-8, travels to top-seed Auburndale at 7 p.m. for that crown.
And, Tohopekaliga (22-1) will reprise last year's 7A-5 title game against Lake Nona (15-5), the only team to beat the Tigers this year, Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at Toho.
Against the Kowboys, the Tigers (22-1) lost the first set and trailed big early in the second and third sets, but somehow clawed back to win a 15-25, 25-22, 25-21, 21-25, 15-12 instant classic.
"They say beating a team three times in a season is hard, I guess that's how you do it," THS Coach Eric Capestany said. "We have kids who have been through the grind here, seniors who have built this up from day one (the school opened in their freshman year). Osceola is a phenomenal team, the program that's the benchmark in this county, so to beat them three times in a year speaks to what we've done this year."
Setter Arianna Warner kept the Tigers' offense steady, tallying 38 assists. Danna Aguilera had 16 kills, Alexa Ortega had eight, and four other players chipped in at least 5.
Osceola (20-7), who will have to hope for an at-large bid into the regional playoffs, played clean in the first set behind the hitting of Yarelis Lopez and Kaitlyn Taylor, won it, and took leads of 7-0 and 12-3 in the second set. Worse for Toho, Ortega limped off the court around that time. Warner, Aguilera and Tehani Liborio took over with big passes, hits and blocks to help the Tigers come back. Osceola jumped out early in the third set, too, taking a 6-0 lead thanks to the hitting of Ahnika Johnston. But again it was Aguilera, this time with help from Josi Capellan, who helped THS dig out of another hole.
The Kowboys stayed a step ahead the whole four set to set up a deciding fifth set that had all the swings of your favorite roller coaster.
Toho, up 5-0.
Osceola, scoring the next six points.
The Tigers taking an 11-6 lead.
The Kowboys pulling to 12-11.
But it was the hitting of Jody Arroyo and blocking of Paige Patterson, who fought a gimpy ankle all week, that helped close out the win after nearly three hours.
"Paige wasn't cleared 24 hours ago. Between God and God-knows-what, she played through it," Capestany said. "Arianna came out in the third set because she was hyperventilating. Ortega came out, got taped up and came back. I have no words for what happened."
The four district champions and four at-large teams chosen by MaxPreps computer rankings will move on to regional playoff action that starts Wednesday.
