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The Winchester High School boys volleyball team (15-6), seeded 15th in Division 1, hosted the 18th-seeded Methuen Rangers (15-6) in the Round of 32 on May 30, and the home team was able to prevail, 3-2.
The Red & Black now moves on to the Sweet 16, where they will take on host Natick (17-2, second seed) Tuesday night (June 3) at 5:30 p.m. Natick defeated Andover (11-10, 34th seed) in its Round of 32 matchup on June 1.
“This was an outstanding high school volleyball match,” said Coach John Fleming afterwards. “Both teams battled back and forth from the first point to the last. Methuen is very well-coached, and had some big-time hitters and the setter was terrific.”
Fleming admits his team should have closed out the first set, and more or less needed that second set, which went down to the wire, as well.
“Our guys did a great job down the stretch in that second set,” he explained, “while in the third set, we played from behind most of the time. We just couldn’t keep up with their hitters, but in the fourth set, we found our way back, and really blocked well.”
The veteran Winchester coach said that it was important for his team to start the fourth set off well to regain some confidence and momentum, and they did just that. It was then onto the fifth set, something they have been accustomed to this year. It’s so critical here in this set to at least match the other team point for point, and the Winchester boys were able to do that, while holding onto an 8-7 lead, before they switched sides.
When the score was 11-10 in favor of Winchester, David You made an amazing diving play that resulted directly in a point, and Haoran Jiang followed that point up with a timely dump to win the next one. Bryan Jiang then had two big blocks to finish off the Rangers.
“It was an awesome high school environment, which made for a great experience for the players, and it was also good to get this win against a really tough Methuen team,” Fleming said.
Tuto Sampaio (27 kills, 10 blocks), Ethan Lubomirski (7 digs), Julien He (14 kills), Bryan Jiang (7 kills, 10 blocks), Hoaran Jiang (14 assists) and You (22 assists) all contributed mightily to the victory.
