Tumwater’s balance upends Ridgefield in four sets for district crown

District championship matches can be tough to approach.

Both teams know they’re getting a trophy at the end of the match; both teams know they’re headed for state the following week.

Tumwater High School found a productive path through its four-set Class 2A District 4 title victory against Ridgefield in the Thunderbirds’ gym Saturday afternoon, claiming both the larger of those two trophies and progress toward being a tough out next weekend when the state tournament comes to Saint Martin’s University.

“We learned something about playing great teams with big hitters,” said Tumwater coach Tana Otton after her second-ranked team downed the Spudders and 6-foot-3 Sarena Bartley, 25-19, 25-18, 23-25, 25-17.

Typically, sophomore outside hitter Kennedy Croft was a force, totaling 28 kills on a .304 percentage and senior Jaeya Reed was an all-around thorn in Ridgefield’s side with 18 digs, 15 kills and three aces. Cristina Hegarty added 22 digs.

Junior setter Maddy Pilon stepped into unexplored territory, ringing up a Tumwater school-record 59 assists — breaking a mark she had shared with Courtney Bowen, who last played on the T-Birds state runner-up team in 2012.

Beyond those performances, Otton was heartened by breakout matches from Tumwater’s middle hitters, junior Ali Smith and senior Anela Cairns. Smith had six kills without an error while Cairns tallied seven kills with just one miscue.

“They were more involved in both matches today than they’ve been all year,” said Otton, whose team won its morning semifinal 3-0 over Woodland. “Teams know Kennedy is going to be hitting, it gives us more balance to get Ali and Anela involved.”

Tumwater (17-0) used a 9-1 run fueled by a pair of kills by Smith, two by Croft, a block by junior Brooke Hare and an ace by Pilon to break away from a narrow 10-7 lead in the first set. In the second, the T-Birds scored the last seven points to snap an 18-18 tie with two kills by Croft and an ace from Reed the highlights.

Ridgefield (14-3) won the third set, surviving an airtight battle in which the lead changed hands or a tie was created on 34 of the 48 points played, but Tumwater pulled away from a 3-3 tie to decisively win the fourth, fittingly finishing the match with a powerful cross-court kill by Croft.

This story was originally published November 7, 2015 at 8:39 PM with the headline "Tumwater’s balance upends Ridgefield in four sets for district crown."