In naval terms, the Cave Spring Knights volleyball team would best be described as a destroyer.
Tuesday night against the Hidden Valley Titans, the musical accompaniment was “Roe, Roe, Roe your boat.”
Riding an incessant attack at the net, junior Piper Roe led a Knight power surge as Cave Spring ended two years of frustration against their Southwest County rivals with a straight set 25-20; 25-16; 25-22 victory.
“Piper had a coming out party tonight,” Cave Spring head coach Tamalyn Tanis said after the win. “She’s tough to beat when she’s on her game. Until tonight, she’s been frustrated against Hidden Valley.”
That trend ended in a hurry Tuesday in a boisterous Cave Spring gym anchored by the loud student sections of both schools.
Roe launched a game-high 13 kills and rejected 6 Titan shots as most of the decisive shots at the net went the Knights’ way. Senior twin sisters Tessa and Charity Klimaitis had Roe’s back all night, attacking from every angle of the Cave Spring rotation. Tessa slammed down 6 kills and added 4 blocks, while Charity pounded the Titans with 11 kills and brought up 10 digs. Junior Alayna Foutz had 16 digs for the Knights.
For a while Tuesday it looked like Hidden Valley might have some new tricks up its sleeve. The Titans, who lost 4 key seniors from last year’s Group 3A state championship team, jumped out to a 14-9 lead in the opening set before Cave Spring chipped away to forge a 19-19 deadlock. Then the Roe-show took over, with 2 kills and a block leading to a 6-1 Knight run that secured the opener.
“I got so excited when we came back to win the first set,” Roe, who has verbally committed to play for Louisville, noted. “At that point I just let it go and thought “don’t let up. This is a big rivalry match.”
Let up they didn’t.
In the second set Cave Spring pulled away from a 12-11 lead to go on a 7-1 run for a 19-12 advantage. The Knights led 23-16, and when Shannon Holsinger launched a kill for the 24th point and Roe scored by dropping a dink right in the middle of the Titan defense, Cave Spring was in firm control, up 2-0.
Hidden Valley didn’t roll over. The Titans led 17-13 before Cave Spring came back to tie things at 18. The third set was knotted at 22 before the Knights scored the last three points to clinch the match.
“This win was so big for us,” Charity Klimaitis said afterward.
Tessa agreed, “We know who they are and we’ve learned to play every point.”
Titan sophomore standout Drew Freeland was impressed by the Knights effort. “Cave Spring is a great team. They wanted it more than we did tonight. We just need to keep practicing hard.”
Freeland led Hidden Valley with 19 assists and 7 digs, while junior Bre Lockhart had 8 kills for the Titans. Senior Sarah Mitchell added 6 kills and 6 digs for Hidden Valley.
“We know we have talent,” Tanis added. “We just have to execute. It was a rivalry match and Hidden Valley never gave up.”
“Too many errors,” Hidden Valley head coach Carla Poff noted. “Georgia Farthing was consistent and Drew set well. It was the unforced errors that were the difference in the game.”
Cave Spring improved to 11-0 on the season and has swept all 33 sets along the way. These two teams meet again on Halloween Eve in the Titan gym.
“We’ve got three weeks to get ready,” Poff pointed out.
“It’ll be fun,” Tessa Klimaitis said with a huge grin of the October 30th rematch.
The match marked another milestone as Tanis picked up her 300th career win as Cave Spring’s head coach, a tenure since 2002 that has included 5 state volleyball championships for the Knights.
Bill Turner
