Volleyball Securs Trip to State Sectional Finals

Third time proved to be a charm on Monday afternoon when the top seeded River Dell Lady Hawks volleyball team rolled to a resounding 25-19, 25-14 win over 4th seeded Pascack Valley Indians (15-10). The Lady Hawks won a pair of regular season matches against the Indians previously.

For the first time in several years, River Dell is now heading to the North Group 2 sectional finals at Passaic County Tech in Wayne for a 5:30pm showdown with the Mahwah T-Birds (23-4) on Thursday. The T-Birds as the third seed knocked off the second seeded Ramapo Raiders (16-7) on Monday, 28-26, 25-14. River Dell and Mahwah split their regular season matches this fall.

"I want this so bad, but we're going to take it one step at a time," head coach Dianne Furusawa said. "We have not been to Passaic County Tech since 2006 when we lost to Chatham. Mahwah came here and we beat them when Kate [Brock] injured her ankle, so now let's beat them with Kate at 100%."

From the first whistle River Dell dominated the court while seeming at ease in their semifinal appearance. Brock got her team rolling with a deep shot into the back of the court and the Hawks never looked back. Even though the Indians continued to fight for points behind the efforts of Chrissy Loganchuck and Kim Yoo (6 kills each), Kaitlin MacIver (14 assists) and Chelsea Masschione (8 digs), Pascack Valley could not convert their long rallies into a consistent scoring machine.

Furusawa credited her juniors Lindsay Clark (libero) and Mary Maccabee (middle blocker/right side hitter) for stepping up.

"Mary played a great game today; Lindsay has been growing since day one with her confidence," Furusawa said.

River Dell has a 21-3 record for the season and is ranked 6th by the Star Ledger across the state.

Passaic County Tech is located at 45 Reinhardt Road in Wayne. The game begins at 5:30pm.