Plymouth Whitemarsh sweeps Abington to claim outright SOL American title

WHITEMARSH >> Rylie Watton and the Plymouth Whitemarsh girls volleyball seniors had been waiting a long time for their hard work to pay off.

It came Thursday as the Colonials were strong from the service line and kept visiting Abington at bay throughout to sweep the visiting Galloping Ghosts 3-0 (25-20, 25-12, 25-19) to secure the outright Suburban One League American Conference championship.

“I’ve been playing since I was a freshman and this is my senior year – there’s 10 seniors so we kind of built it together,” said Watton, PW’s setter. “And finally seeing it all come together is all really special.”

The Colonials closed out the first two games with aces while Caroline Veon’s trio of aces during a five-point run in the third helped put the hosts in control as Plymouth Whitemarsh remained undefeated and earned its first conference title since 2018.

“It means so much to us,” PW senior outside hitter Neve Straff said. “We worked so hard the past four years, everyone and it’s just amazing that we could get this win. We’ve been wanting to beat Abington by this much for so long and it’s really good that we won.”

Plymouth Whitemarsh’s last outright SOL championship came in 2016 with the Colonials claiming a share of the American title in both of the next two years.

Over the following three seasons, the Colonials stayed  among the conference’s better sides – tying for second in 2020 while finishing third in 2019 and 2021 – but Thursday PW (16-0, 10-0 SOL American) returned to the top.

“It’s a special group of kids for sure,” Colonials coach Dave Stewart said. “I really have appreciated them. Coming back to coaching after 12 years off and being three years down the road, these guys were literally in my room from day one. Talking volleyball, talking life in general but they’re just fantastic kids and they work really hard.

“We talk about it all the time, that you put hard work in you should get rewarded for that hard work and we’ve seen that throughout the season, it’s just something that I’ve really appreciated about this group.”

Kenya Lucas had 10 kills for Abington (14-3, 8-3), which had its seven-match winning streak snapped – the Ghosts’ last defeat coming in their first meeting with PW, falling in four sets at home Sept. 20. Sasha Moody added six kills while Mary Carter collected 21 assists.

“I just think we’re not ready for this moment yet and we’re trying to get there,” Abington coach Dan Marsh said. “PW played fantastic and they’re a very good team but we did not play up to our potential. “We made a lot of mistakes. We’re a, what, an 87 percent serving team, something like that, we missed four in the first set, we’re making errors we don’t normally make.”

Abington, which is seventh in the District 1-4A rankings, has two more regular-season games, both at home – Cheltenham 6:15 p.m. Tuesday then Pennsbury 5 p.m. Thursday.

“We’re giving them off for the weekend, we’re giving them off tomorrow and Saturday and we’re going to refocus Monday and get ready for the playoffs,” Marsh said. “Whoever we play I think we’re going to be a tough out, I think we’re very talented offensively and if we can get things going and play the way that we’re capable, we can cause some problems. But we can’t be inconsistent like we were today, especially against a very good team.”

The Colonials sit second in the district 4A rankings – fellow unbeaten Unionville holds the No. 1 spot – hosts Avon Grove for a nonleague match 1:45 p.m. Saturday then has two road conference contest next week – at New Hope-Solebury 3:30 p.m. Tuesday then at Cheltenham 3:30 p.m. Thursday.

“It’s really exciting,” Watton said. “We just need to keep pushing, keep our heads up, not get too confident or anything cause we want to play even-headed when we head into the playoffs.”

In the first set, Plymouth Whitemarsh never trailed after four straight points put the Colonials up 6-3. But Abington stayed close, never letting the margin grow larger than four before a 5-1 run had the Ghosts even at 19.

PW, however, went up 20-19 after an Abington service error then won the following two points. After calling a timeout, the Ghosts pulled to within 22-20 but the Colonials took the next three – a Kayla DiGuglielmo ace sealing a 25-20 victory.

“I think it just shows our mental capabilities and I think part of it, like I said, a lot of us have played together for a while so we made connections,” Watton said. “And we have struggled with that in the past. We were not very good at coming back or if we were up we wouldn’t be able to keep that lead but this year I think our mental game is just as strong as our physical game so it helps us a lot in that aspect.”

Plymouth Whitemarsh had an easier time in the second game – six straight points finishing its 10-2 burst that put the home side up 11-4. An ace from Staff had the Colonials up eight at 14-6 and forced Abington to call timeout.

“We work at practice just to serve seams and perfect our serves,” Straff said. “And make the other team move and move their feet and get them off the court.

The Ghosts were down six after a Lucas ace made it 15-9 but PW answered with six straight points, extending its lead to a dozen. The Colonials’ advantage stayed in double digits with a Natalie Small ace finishing the 25-12 victory.

“Serving game is a big part of our game,” said Stewart, who is in his second stint at PW – returning in 2020 after previously coaching the program from 1994-2008. “We really do try to get teams out of system and off balance and the kids did a fantastic job of that today. From that perspective, outside of that, I think they did a really nice job of just playing solid defense.

“Look, a player like Kenya and some of their other kids, they’re going to get balls and they’re going to put them away and we realize that and recognize it. The big thing is stay focused, stay on task, do your job and the kids if a ball went down they just jumped right back and they took care of business.”

The third game was tied at five before Plymouth Whitemarsh collected the next four points. Three times Abington pulled to within one, the last time at 13-12 but a Small kick and consecutive Veon aces put PW up 16-12.

After the Colonials took the next point, Veon served another ace for an 18-12 edge. Abington came out of a timeout and won two straight points to make it 18-14 but four was as close as the Ghosts could get.

Plymouth Whitemarsh pushed its advantage to seven at 23-16 then again at 24-17 before closing out the sweep with a 25-19 win.

“I think that we came out extremely strong today,” Straff said. “We were mentally focused and physically focused and that’s what we needed. We came out strong and we pushed ourselves to be our best.”