TOWAMENCIN — Jude Rotondo always just seemed to be there.
The Pennridge senior outside hitter is understandably a focal point of the Rams’ offense, but his impact goes far beyond that. Friday night, in the tight spots against Dock Mennonite, Rotondo seemed to be in the middle of the key plays as the resilient Rams passed an early season test.
Pennridge topped the Pioneers 3-0, winning 25-20, 25-23 and 26-24 in a tightly contested, well-played match at Dock’s Longacre Gym.
“We got pushed a lot tonight,” Rotondo said. “We don’t see anything like them in our conference, that’s why it’s great to play these kinds of out-of-conference games and they push us every year.
“We’ve played them the last three years and it’s always been a great match.”
Rotondo tallied a match-best 13 kills with two service aces and he was far from a one-man show. Senior contributions included Bryce Ammon adding 11 kills and setter Evan Jalonski posting 29 assists and three kills while his brother, sophomore Logan Jalonski had 10 digs and five aces.
A key part of Pennidge’s 5-0 start has been the team’s strong ability to serve and sustain runs behind the line. The Rams didn’t have a long serving run Friday, but they stacked up enough spurts in key moments, plus nine aces as a team, to create momentum.
“We have a bunch of guys going back there hitting good serves and hitting aggressive serves,” Rams coach Dave Childs said. “If someone’s off, the next guy’s going to step right back there and hopefully we get enough runs to pull off a win.”
Pennridge isn’t going to be hesitant behind the line, Rotondo saying he likes the variety of serves his teammates can rip, but it does sometimes lead to errors. Dock coach Kirby King felt like his team got a lot of points off those service errors, but not enough from their offense to take advantage.
The Pioneers only tallied 17 kills as a team, led by seven from senior Cameron LeSeur. Dock more than held its own by challenging at the net and scrambling defensively, racking up 27 digs, but wasn’t able to put away late leads in the second or third sets.
“Our whole team has never played these positions before, everybody’s in a new position for the entire team,” King said. “I like the passion they have, they want to play and they’re into it and loud, which is really fun to coach. I like the way we have a net presence, we had a lot of touches and a lot of slowdowns and we can really get scrappy defensively.”
Rotondo pointed to Dock’s size and offensive discipline as a couple areas the Pioneers have always challenged the Rams with. Childs echoed his senior captain that Dock’s size and strong hitters present a much different look than they see in their conference matches.
With both teams usually contending for state playoff slots, Pennridge in 3A and Dock in 2A, it makes sense for both programs to play each other. It also showed during the numerous long rallies that highlighted Friday’s three sets.
Pennridge trailed by five points in the second set before rallying back to win and faced a set point in the deciding third game before closing it out.
“There were high level plays on both sides, it didn’t feel like we were up a lot or down a lot, I was surprised half the time when I looked at the scoreboard because it felt like such a back and forth battle,” Childs said.
King said he believes the Pioneers will need to be playing on the level of a Pennridge by the end of the season to make the state playoffs. With just two Class 2A teams in District 1, Dock would have to win that game, then a one-match play-in against the District 11 champion to get into the field.
He called LeSeur a leader for the team while setter Trevor Ridge’s energy has been infectious. Justin Panaia, a junior and basketball player in his first year of volleyball, has also been an early standout.
“We got caught in two rotations on serving, the first game with their first server and in the second game, a different rotation with the same effect and coming back to that rotation in the third game, they scored a lot of points,” King said. “If we could have got a pass and we could have threatened them at three spots on the net, we would have had a better chance to get out of it.”
Pennridge will play in Northeasten’s Bobcat Invitational tournament on Saturday, capping a long week for the Rams.
“I think we can hit with anyone,” Childs said. “We can put a big swing on the ball anywhere on the court with the hitters we have, so we have to worry about getting better at the rest of our game.”
Rotondo has committed to play at Belmont Abbey next year. He’s got some things he’d like to take care of before that
“We have great chemistry and a lot of great players,” Rotondo said. “I’m excited to see how this plays out, I think we’ve got a great team this year.”
