BY STEPHEN LYNCH | August 20, 2019
Holly Franks-Russell made her Centennial High School coaching debut on Tuesday night. Her team made it a match the 28-year old will long remember for more than just that reason, though.
The Golden Hawks rallied from two games to zero deficit to claim a thrilling five set victory (17-25, 11-25, 25-23, 25-11, 15-11) over visiting Clovis High.
“For us to not only beat a team like (Clovis), but to come back from losing two sets is incredible,” Franks-Russell said. “It shows off what we’re capable of. It shows what we can overcome. Not a lot of teams can do that. I definitely have something special here. I’m very blessed.”
After starting out slowly and getting soundly beaten in both Game 1 and Game 2 by a more experienced Cougars squad, Centennial turned up the intensity at the beginning of the third set.
Determined to stave off elimination and get back into the match, the Golden Hawks battled their way to a narrow Game 3 win with an outstanding team effort.
That positive result seemed to give Centennial a huge momentum boost. Propelled by the continued strong play of twin sisters Nya and Nariah Prescott , the Golden Hawks dominated the fourth game.
The sophomore outside hitters combined for nine kills and one block during Game 4. But it was an ace by junior Samantha Wulff-Smith that clinched the fourth set for Centennial, forcing a winner-take-all Game 5.
The fifth set featured three early lead changes before Nya Prescott blocked a kill attempt by Zoe Ruskofsky to put Centennial ahead 10-9. The Golden Hawks then scored five of the next seven points to seal the victory.
Nya Prescott had a match-high 13 kills. Nariah Prescott finished with 10 kills and Juliana Alexander was right behind her with 7 kills, including a hard spike off a Cougars defender out of bounds for the final point of the match.
“We came together as a team and we had so much energy.” Nariah Prescott said. “And we just had so much fire. We wanted to show them who we are and how we play together. I think that just showed out the last three games.”
Torie George recorded 17 digs and Dani Richert notched 16 for Centennial, which improved to 12-8 against Clovis since 2004.
Wulff-Smith and Emma Hudnall paced the Golden Hawks in assists with 17 and 16 respectively.
Erin Tatum had 12 digs and 11 blocks for Clovis, perennially one of the top Division I teams in the section.
Clovis coach Richard lake said that Game 3 was the defining point of the match.
“We had to get them while we had them down,” Lake said. “We knew if we gave them some life that they would fire back up. Unfortunately, we lost the third game 25-23. Just didn’t have enough to pull it out. After that you could see a real mentality change. They got real confident and their hitters really took over the match. We just didn’t respond on our side.”
Photos by Nick Ellis
