SAN ANTONIO – Sometimes, teams overcome slow starts,
That wasn’t the case Friday for the Sharyland Rattlers as Liberty Hill swept the District 31-5A champs 25-15, 25-23, 25-20 to win the first UIL Region 4-5A semifinal at Northside Sports Gym.
Liberty Hill will play the winner of the second semifinal between Rouse and McAllen Memorial, which followed the first semifinal.
Kenisha Martinez led all hitters with a match high 12 kills and played a major role especially in the final set as the team leaned on their star player and she came up huge down the stretch.
Trailing 23-16 in the third set, the sophomore hitter came up with a pair of back row kills as well as an ace to pull her team to within 23-20. However, slow starts and long gaps of errors and misplayed balls were too much to overcome and Liberty Hill completed the sweep.
“We started too slow, it reminded me of the preseason,” said Sharyland High head coach Raul Castillo, whose team finished with a dominant 45-4 record on the season, at one point winning 29 straight matches. “To have a chance with this team we had to serve them hard, keep them 10 feet from the net and out of system because they were 4, 5 or 6 inches taller than us so we have to do extra.”
The Rattlers were seemingly rattled from the start as Liberty Hill jumped to a 7-1 lead. Shary roared back and pulled to within 12-9 on a Kassandra De La Garza kill. Liberty Hill however, took advantage of multiple errors from Sharyland and kills from Kealy Dimer and Taylor Gaines to pull away.
Liberty Hill jumped out 9-2 in the second set and Sharyland clawed its way back behind a pair of aces from Nicole Cavazos and a kill from America Hernandez. The teams tied at 20, 22 and 23 during the set as the Rattlers regained their aggressiveness they showed all season before a crucial block by Liberty Hill just touched the sideline and the Panthers captured the 2-0 advantage.