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Tigers finally overcome MR

Correspondent photo / Robert Hayes Springfield’s Carly Stitzel, left, watches Lauren Ranelli, right, volley the ball over the net during Wednesday’s 3-1 win over Mineral Ridge.

COLUMBIANA — After winning the first set 25-20, the top-seeded Mineral Ridge Rams looked like they were potentially going to repeat their regular season performance against fourth-seed Springfield, a team they beat twice earlier this season.

The Tigers won the second set by a score of 25-18, then turned on the afterburners by taking the third set 25-7. A 25-14 victory in the fourth set allowed Springfield to walk away with a 3-1 win in the Division IV district semifinal at Columbiana High School.

Tigers coach Angela Jones was speechless.

“My girls played their hearts out, I am so happy for them,” she said. “I just, I don’t know right now, I’m speechless, I’m full of excitement and emotion and I’m just happy for them.

“They deserve this, they earned it.”

Springfield didn’t allow a first-set loss to faze them, and Jones knew what changed as the match went on.

“Our nerves. They were anxious. They were giddy tripping over themselves in the first set. They had a lot of excitement and adrenaline, and they just couldn’t contain it.

“When they control their excitement and adrenaline, boy, they just wanted to be that force to reckon with.”

Senior Lauren Ranelli felt that going into the match with confidence helped.

“We honestly had a team talk at practice, and I think it just helped us realize that we could do it and we just needed to put everything we had into it and that’s exactly what we did,” she said. “I think we just realized that we didn’t have time to mess around, and we had to get it done.”

Ranelli contributed to her team with 30 assists, 12 digs and three aces.

Jones credits play in the Mahoning Valley Athletic Conference for helping her team grow throughout the season.

“It was great. First of all, I’ve got to say our league, we had some really tough competition, and so it was actually nice to face some teams through the year to get us ready for this,” Jones said. “It’s really hard to beat a team three times, and Ridge is phenomenal. I’m not going to take anything away, we just had it together all around tonight.”

Springfield (21-4) advances onto the district final, where they’ll face second-seeded Wellsville at 4 p.m., Saturday at Columbiana High School. They’ll be looking to claim a district title after following short in the district final last season against Salem.

Ranelli wants to take the energy from Wednesday night’s match into Saturday.

“I think we just have to take that feeling with us, because we want to feel that again,” she said.

Meanwhile, Mineral Ridge ends the season with a record of 22-2 and a conference title. Rams coach Ron Lesko said a lot of good things happened in his first season as the program’s coach.

“Like I told the kids, it was a phenomenal season, even though we didn’t win tonight,” he said. “I mean, for them to really come out and finish the season at 22-2, you try to emphasize to them, you did a lot of great things, there’s only one team when this is all said and done that’s going to be happy.

“Unfortunately today wasn’t our day,” he added, “and we’re walking off the court not that happy, but to tell them, you guys did a great job. There’s not too many teams around that even have 20-win seasons. You’re in a unique group to say they that you had a 20-win season, and it really is phenomenal for them to have that many wins. But right now they don’t want to hear that. It’s falling on deaf ears.”

Lesko enjoyed working with his senior class.

“I had four seniors, and unfortunately two of them didn’t really get to see much playing time due to pretty severe injuries, but what a great group,” he said. “Riley Ladd, … she would run through a wall (for her team), and Maddie Carl, what a coachable kid. I mean they’re just phenomenal kids. I was lucky enough my first year to have a group of seniors that were leaders, that stepped up and encouraged. They were positive influences. It was a great group of seniors.”

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