Fountain Hills senior cut outs came to life Tuesday in leading the Falcons past Casteel. (AZPrep365 photo)

 

With injury issues behind it, Fountain Hills girls volleyball team is priming its engine in search of a 3A title repeat.

No. 4 Fountain HIlls honored its five seniors Tuesday night and promptly took care of business on the court with a 25-11, 25-16, 25-19 sweep of No. 14 Casteel in a 3A Metro Region match at Fountain Hills.

Fountain Hill all but had  its region title secured, but the win this night made it official as the Falcons record overall is 38-5, 14-2 in power-ranking matches and 9-0 in region. Its top two attackers -- seniors KC McMahon and Amara Feyrer-Melk - left their fans with a typical effort in their final regular-season home match. McMahon, who leads the state in kills, posted 19 to go with 16 digs. Feyrer-Melk slammed down 17 kills and is quite close to 100 percent after battling injury early in the year. Senior libero Paula Iwaoka checked in with a typical game in the back with a team-high 27 digs.

"The day before we played in the Lions Den Tournament (Oct. 13-14 at Marana Mtn. View) we finally had everybody practicing," Fountain Hills coach Peter McGloin said. "We're building momentum. We're playing the way we're capable of. It's good timing." Feyrer-Melk missed three weeks from late September to mid-October while Schulze didn't play her first match until late September.

Fountain HIlls, which won the Lions Den tourney going 7-0 as part of its current winning streak, likes to employ two setters. An ankle injury to junior setter Corrin Schulze cost her time while Feyrer-Melk was on the mend. Schulze and fellow junior Alyssa Barbagallo contributed 22 and 23 assists, respectively, on Tuesday. Schulze also served four aces -- all in succession -- in the opening set. That was a real trouble spot for Casteel, who surrendered seven aces in the first set.

Serve-receive improved for Casteel (15-14 overall, 11-5 prm, 6-3 regon) as the match went on, but Fountain Hills was in system nearly the entire match. With the hitting prowess of McMahon and Feyrer-Melk combining for a .500 hitting percentage, that was trouble enough without the aces.

Casteel led the first set briefly by a point twice, but never led the rest of the match. The Colts are devoid of seniors as a school in only their second season, but have put improved from last year';s 9-26 campaign. Casteel still has one last shot at a playoff berth as they host Valley Christian Thursday night. The top two teams in each of 3A's six regions earn automatic playhoff berths. A win by Casteel Thursday over Valley Christian would make them 1-1 in region. The second tie-breaker is best conference record (Casteel would be 12-5 .706 percentage) to Valley Christian's 8-4, .667). Valley Christian won the first meeting, 3-1.