Capital gets No. 1 district seed

Prep Volleyball: Cougars end North Kitsap's perfect streak in subdistrict victory

GRANT CLARK; For The Olympian | • Published November 04, 2009

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Forget about being beaten. North Kitsap's volleyball team hadn't even been tested this season, steamrolling through the opposition en route to earning a No. 2 state ranking.

But whatever confidence the Vikings gained after going a perfect 15-0 was shaken by the time the fourth set rolled around in Tuesday’s subdistrict title match.

Credit a stellar team effort from Capital for that.

The Cougars, champions of the Western Cascade Conference, knocked North Kitsap, winner of the Olympic League, from the ranks of the unbeaten with an impressive 3-1 (26-24, 23-25, 25-22, 25-9) victory over the visiting Vikings at Capital High School.

“It was just a complete team effort tonight,” Capital coach Natalie Zukowski said. “I was very pleased with our defense and on offense everyone was contributing.”

With the win, Capital (10-5) gets a No. 1 seed at the Class 3A West Central District tournament.

The Cougars begin district play against the No. 8 seed from the Seamount/South Puget Sound League on Friday at 2 p.m. at Auburn Mountainview High.

The top eight teams from the tournament advance to state.

Kristyn Ross, the Western Cascade’s MVP, sparked Capital’s offense, registering 28 kills, including the winner in the fourth set.

“She’s our steady performer. She’s just consistent and goes out there and leads the way for us,” Zukowski said. “Once she gets going everyone starts to feed off it.”

That was the case Tuesday.

The first set remained close throughout before Ross took over with Capital trailing, 21-19.

Back-to-back kills by Ross reclaimed the lead for the Cougars before the junior followed up an ace with her eighth kill of the set to give Capital a 26-24 win.

The Cougars appeared headed toward a 2-0 advantage after leading 22-17, but the Vikings battled back in the second set behind hard-hitting sophomore Sarah Baugh, who scored four consecutive points on kills for North Kitsap to give the Vikings a 24-23 lead.

A block by North Kitsap’s Indigo Williams ended the set, 25-23.

Capital once enjoyed a comfortable lead in the third set, holding a 21-15 advantage following a Gabi Vega kill, only to see the Vikings close the deficit to 21-19.

This time, however, the Cougars didn’t falter, getting a Taylor Johnson kill to pick up the 25-22 win.

Capital raced out to leads of 5-1, 14-3 and 21-8 in the fourth set before winning 25-9 to close out the match.

“North Kitsap is a very tough team,” Zukowski said. “We knew it was going to be difficult tonight. Hopefully we’re peaking at the right time. I think we are. We had some blips at the start of the season, but the team has really been improving. Winning tonight gives us a lot of confidence heading into districts.”