Repeat Complete: No. 1 IHA beats No. 2 North Hunterdon for 2nd straight ToC title by Brian Bobal of NJ Advance Media for nj.com
Heading up to William Paterson in the middle of November is nothing new for Sydney Taylor. In four years on the Immaculate Heart team, she’s been in this position four times and she wasn’t ready to leave without one last victory.
Her nine kills coupled with other big performances around her made it happen, as top-seeded Immaculate Heart, No. 1 in the NJ.com Top 20, topped second-seeded and No. 2 ranked North Hunterdon 2-0 to win its second consecutive Tournament of Champions title in Wayne.
It’s the ninth ToC title overall for the Blue Eagles.
“I really wouldn’t want to win it any other way,” said Taylor. “I wouldn’t want to win it with any other team. To be in the ToC final four years in a row and to win it the last two is an amazing feeling.”
Taylor’s production in the victory was evenly spread throughout. Anytime she wound up on the outside, she was pounding the ball. The lone senior on the team had a hitting percentage of 50 on the day.
That number would’ve been higher if not for the team on the other side of the net.
North Hunterdon’s defense has been stout all season and after a rocky start in the first game, was able to settle down and keep a lot of balls in play. Unfortunately for the Lions, Immaculate Heart was doing the same thing.
“We did a good job of keeping balls alive today,” said Immaculate Heart coach Maria Nolan. “You never know from that team. They’ll just give you something crazy where you don’t expect it and our defense came through. We’re up there with the best of them.”
Immaculate Heart stormed out to a 10-3 lead in the first game and North Hunterdon couldn’t get a consistent run going long enough to close the gap in the 25-20 score.
Knowing a repeat title was just 25 points away, the Blue Eagles came out swinging one more time at the start of the second game.
“Coming in we were all nervous,” said Maeve Duffin. “That’s bound to happen. We shook off the nerves and worked together and fought for each other. It’s Sydney’s last year so we wanted to win it for her. We wanted to win it for coach Nolan and for ourselves. We really got it together and played.”
While Immaculate Heart surrendered an early 3-0 lead, it got right back on a roll and slowly extended its lead bit by bit. Taylor helped lead the way with five kills in the game, but the team’s ‘X-Factor’ in Lizzie Patterson became a force, creatively rolling to six kills, bumping her total for the game up to eight.
Duffin and fellow setter Olivia Coughlin were both terrific as well when each was called upon, recording a total of 22 assists. Seven of Duffin’s 12 assists came in the final game, while Coughlin had an even five-five split.
“(Winning) feels really great, especially this being my first varsity season,” Coughlin said. “We didn’t really know what was going to happen. We had a lot of doubt after losing a lot of players so to be able to get it done feels great.”
While the Blue Eagles held a consistent lead in the second set, North Hunterdon slowly climbed back in and got to within three points at 19-16 when Nolan called a timeout.
“We knew they were very strong,” said Anna Morris, who had four kills and three blocks. “They have some big girls, hit hard and play good defense, but we’ve played so many strong teams before so coming in we knew no matter who we’re playing we knew what we could do.”
The group on the other side consisting of Eleanor Stothoff and Caroline Layding, to name a few, became a force in the second game especially. Stothoff recorded four kills in the game overall and Layding had 10, many of which came in that last set.
The Lions got the score as close as 21-19, but a service error returned the ball, and all the momentum, back to Immaculate Heart and the team would go on to close out a 25-21 victory to seal the deal.
Alyssa Lowther had two kills overall and Erin Meaney chipped in a block and two digs. Morris was one of the stars defensively with 11 digs to go with her three blocks.
Kyra Hissner picked up five kills for North Hunterdon and Riley Koehler added three. Hissner also had a team-high 11 assists with Julia Pereira. Jackie Wolters had two kills of her own.