AWHS Girls Varsity Volleyball smashes San Marin High School

Ethan Frankel

AWHS varsity volleyball celebrating after an ace by senior Ella Heimbrodt that won them a point.

AWHS Girls Varsity Volleyball was victorious over San Marin High School on Wednesday, Sept. 22 at the AWHS home gym. The Falcons only needed the minimum of 3/5 sets to defeat San Marin. The sets were scored 25-10, 25-10 , and 25-14, all in favor of AWHS.

The first set started a bit shaky for AWHS, who fell behind 6-9. They were able to turn it around from that point on and went on a 16-1 run to win the first set by 15 points. A major contributor to this turnaround was junior libero Lauren Barnwell, who brought the Falcons back with a serving run of over 10 points. 

The girls were able to keep this momentum going and won the second set comfortably, 25-10. The third set was competitive, and went back and forth before the Falcons were able to run away with it in the end to win the match in three straight sets. 

“We played our entire roster, we had an opportunity to play everyone. We felt comfortable enough against our opponent to give everyone on the team a chance to play,” said AWHS Girls Varsity Volleyball Coach Lisa Hudson.

Junior Elsa Snipes leaping up to go for a kill to win a point for the Falcons. (Ethan Frankel)

There were a few players who statistically stood out from the rest of the team. Senior Ella Heimbrodt had 12 kills (when a player returns the ball to the other team that the team is then unable to return back) and 12 digs (when a player recovers the opposition’s attempted kill). Junior Elsa Snipes had 9 kills to go with her 7 digs, junior Sati Brewer had 18 assists (passes that set up kills), and sophomore Reese Fraser had 13 assists to go alongside her 5 kills and 2 aces. The AWHS Varsity Volleyball team heads over to Terra Linda High School to play the Trojans Friday, Sept. 24. The Falcons are heading into the game on Friday with a league record of 2-0. They hope to improve on this record by doing better against the Trojans than they did in the pre-season.

“We beat them in the pre season in five [sets], but we had to forfeit because we played Elsa and Phoebe who weren’t eligible,” Hudson said. “It was the first time we had beaten them at their gym in 3 years,”

AWHS hopes to keep their momentum from their past two league wins into the game on Friday against the Trojans, and into the rest of the MCAL season. The Falcons hope to be able to win a banner at the end of the year after the MCAL season.

Sophomore libero, Amelia Richer, goes to set the ball for her teammates to return. (Ethan Frankel)