NEW WASHINGTON (Crawford County Now) — Mohawk came in needing a win to prevent Buckeye Central from claiming its first league crown since 2021. After losing the first set 25-16, the Lady Warriors stormed back to win 25-20, 25-19, 25-22 in a Northern 10 Athletic Conference match Tuesday night.
The victory puts both teams at 11-2 with one league game remaining. Seneca East visits Buckeye Central and Upper Sandusky travels to Mohawk Thursday in regular season finales.
Buckeye Central (16-5, 11-2) began red hot, going up 7-1 in the first set.
“We had a phenomenal start. The girls came out and passed well and that was the story of the game,” Buckettes head coach Missy McDougal said.
“We were able to attack that first set and then after that we really struggled to get the ball to our setter, and we couldn’t attack. So we were giving them free balls, and against a team like Mohawk you can’t afford to give them easy balls because they’re big.”
Chloe Miller, Biz Klopp, freshman Mara Haynes and Aubrey Gottfried used their size at the net as Mohawk rallied to win the next three sets.
Mohawk moves to 17-4, 11-2.
Klopp had 14 kills, Haynes added 11, Miller 10, Jaylan Huffman six and Gottfried five.
Junior setter Reese Hoover had 37 assists and Emerson Gurney 25 digs from her libero spot. Klopp had four blocks.
“I wasn’t sure what was going on there at the beginning. We couldn’t get any offense going and when we did we couldn’t put it away,” Lady Warriors head coach Eric Hoover said.
“They were digging everything up. You’ve got to win three sets regardless if you lose 25-0 in the first one. We were able to get together and everybody started doing their job better.”
Both teams suffered through periods of mental mistakes and playing out of system.
But the second set turned the tide in favor of Mohawk. Miller, Gottfried and Haynes rallied Mohawk, going up 3-1 and never looking back.
Maren McDougal and AJ Jury kept it tight as BC pulled to within 14-12 but could get no closer.
Set three saw Mohawk come out strong taking a 9-2 lead. Buckeye Central rallied as Harper Kantzer had an ace and Milania Chamberlain’s kill made it 12-10, but from there the Lady Warriors’ size and efficiency took over for a 25-19 win.
“They’re a very good defensive team and we were able to get a lot more offense going than we did the first time. We cut down on our errors. We’ve been working on our out-of-system stuff, and we did a good job of that and living to play on,” Hoover said.
“We got a lot better touches at the net in the second, third and fourth sets. We made it tough for them to score.”
A few players were battling colds and not at full strength, Hoover said.
“Emily Brickner stepped in there and did well for us.”
Brickner had a pair of aces. Mallory Brickner added 12 digs, as did Reese Hoover.
“We had a lot of dropped balls tonight. That’s uncharacteristic. We don’t usually do that,” McDougal said.
“We got down that second set and they couldn’t pull themselves out of it. Kudos to Mohawk. They came in and put us on our heels and we just didn’t respond tonight.”
Miller, a 6-foot junior outside hitter, said her team was prepared to play realizing what was at stake.
“We know we can potentially share the title. We were excited to pull it all together,” she said.
Miller’s kill sealed the fourth set. She added a pair of blocks, along with Huffman, Gottfried and Haynes.
“The first time we felt like it was another game. This time we knew that we needed to win, so we stepped it up a bit,” Miller said. “To know that we are sharing the title with BC feels good.”
Buckeye Central won the first meeting in Sycamore in five sets.
“I don’t think they did anything differently this time. I just felt our serve-receive didn’t allow us to attack like we had hoped to. We were out of system the entire game,” McDougal said.
The Buckettes can still share the league title.
“Obviously, we are very disappointed. We wanted to win it outright. We have a tough game on Thursday. Seneca East isn’t going to come in here and roll over,” she added.
“There’s nothing to hang your head about if you can pull off a co-championship with Mohawk. That’s our goal still, and it’s within reach.”
Hoover said: “To be able to get revenge on Carey last week and now BC. We had a couple of chances to win that first time around, but we had hit a midseason slump there.
“Everyone has one more game before anyone has won anything. We have senior night Thursday, and we will have a focused practice on Wednesday to get ready to roll on Thursday.”
Buckeye Central won the junior varsity contest 25-15, 25-18.