Western Albemarle’s season came to an unexpected screeching halt when the Warriors smashed into a Freedom High team on a roll that mirrored Western’s own before Tuesday night.
Freedom, seeded seventh in the Region II quarterfinals, used a strong defensive effort from their backline and a bigtime output from junior Jasmine Johnson to knock off the Warriors and get a shot at the state tournament Thursday night with a 3-2 victory.
“It’s huge — it’s going to give us the building block we need, especially for next year,” Freedom coach Jim Clark. “They’re starting to believe in themselves.”
Western put together big offensive numbers across their front line, with Ana Asher, Katie Rossberg posting 14 kills each while Allie Nicholson registered 12 kills of her own. But the Eagles got enough stops during the five games to grab a win, largely with dig after dig from sophomore libero Andrea Phung and her sister Courtney Phung, who combined to come up with big plays all night. Andre Phung was a second team all-Dulles District honoree.
Western won game one when Nicholson cranked a huge kill to give the Warriors a narrow advantage at 24-22 and Freedom committed an error on the next point. Then in game two, Western’s Maggie Kooken came up with a dig and kill combination on a critical play to put the Warriors up 12-11, but the Warriors failed to seize the momentum and Freedom eventually evened the match with a 4-1 run at the end of the game.
Western grabbed a critical game three and seemed to take control of the match with that win, largely because Marin Crowder was matching the Phung sisters nearly dig for dig. But Freedom managed to rebound with another late run capping a win in game four despite a strong effort from Rossberg at the net during that frame.
The Eagles carried that momentum to a 12-5 lead in the fifth during a run that two Western timeouts failed to slow down. The Warriors managed to rally back to 13-10 before a pair of Western errors ended the match and its season.
“(Freedom) plays out of system really well,” said Western coach Lance Rogers. “They were able to put the ball back into play with pace, regroup and get ready for the next play. We didn’t do quite as good of a job at that.”
Asher, in her final match at Western as the squad’s lone senior, broke the single season kills record set by current Maryland standout Sarah Harper. Western finishes 2010 with a 23-3 record that includes the Jefferson District regular season and tournament titles.
